Pokemon Mystery Dungeon: Explorers of Light Book 1: The Protectors
by BraviaryGirl7
Summary: When I came to Tranquil Town with my mission the only thing on my mind, I didn't even realize I had pushed my limits. Luckily for me, I made kind friends in the forms of Bulbasaur, Squirtle, and Charmander. But when I found myself forming a team with them, I didn't even realize I was getting them involved in my battle...-S My very first fanfic!
1. Chapter 1: The Mysterious Pikachu

Pokémon Mystery Dungeon Explorers of Light Book 1: Team KantoPals, the Protectors.

Chapter 1

(Char's POV)

My name is Char and I'm a Charmander. I live in Tranquility Meadow along with my best friends, Venus the Bulbasaur and Hydro the Squirtle. As the name suggests, Tranquility Meadow is a very peaceful little town.

We've lived together for, I don't know, 10 years now? I never wrote it down on a calendar or anything like that. Anyway, we're all the same age—17. So, we all get along pretty well. Well, more like we've been inseparable friends for years.

Anyway, we all had this dream; to become a great rescue team! Oh, look a rhyme! Ahem, so like I was saying, we wanted to be a rescue team, but we honestly didn't know the first thing about being a rescue team.

Well, it used to be like that… until one day, something came into our lives that changed everything. What's that? You want to know what that "something" is? Well… alright then, but I got to warn you, it's a pretty long story, so you might want to get comfortable. Alright, here goes!

It was a dark and stormy night, (Author's note: cliché much? LOL) and the residents of the meadow were all hunkered down in their homes by now. I didn't blame them; I wouldn't go out in that for a million Poké. Then again, I would die if my tail flame ever went out, so it might just be a Charmander thing.

Anyway, I looked outside the window of our house, (It was a very nice house. Very sturdy, clean, and the floor and walls were completely smoothed out so you wouldn't get splinters) and watched the rain and lightning for a minute. _Yep. Definitely wouldn't want to go out in that, _I thought.

After a few minutes, I heard a voice behind me. "Hey Char. We'regoing to have dinner soon." It was Venus, the more responsible of us three. "Alright," I said. Behind Venus was Hydro, who was carrying a little oil lamp I had lit myself. Venus then extended his vines and started setting up. Hydro placed the lamp on a small table and proceeded to help.

"You guys need some help with that?" I asked. Venus responded by saying, "Nah, we got it tonight. You can close the blinds, though." I smiled. That's Venus for you. Always responsible, and keeping the rest of us responsible.

I walked over to each of the windows and closed the blinds. When I had reached the last one, I looked outside for a second and I was pretty shocked at what I saw.

There, standing out in the middle of the huge storm, was a Pikachu, male judging by the tail, carrying a bag and slowly trudging through the meadow. It looked like it had seen better days; exhausted and scratch covered.

"Hey guys, look! There's someone out there!" I said, getting their attention. I knew none of us had ever seen him around before, so that probably meant that this was his first time here. And seeing as there weren't any hotels or inns around here that probably meant he didn't have a place to stay for the night.

I looked over to my friends, who nodded in response. I had to smile; we were just too nice. I took a deep breathe, and opened the door. "Hey! Hey you!"

He seemed to notice, he turned his head in my direction. "Do you have a place to stay tonight?!" He shook his head in response, as expected. "Well, you're welcome to stay here if you want!" This seemed to surprise him, as if he had never been shown such kindness.

This made me wonder what the Pokémon were like outside Tranquility Meadow. Still a bit taken aback, the Pikachu made his way towards our home. I told Venus to get a towel ready, and Hydro to keep working on dinner.

(Pikachu's POV)

I'll be honest, I had never expected that anyone would want to help me; someone they had never met in their lives before. I made my way to the little wooden house.

As if it weren't enough that they had invited me to stay with them; they had gotten a towel ready so I could dry off. Once I had dried off, I took a moment to look around the house.

In one section, there was a table with glasses and plates all set up nicely. On the other side, were three beds, all made up with straw. Not the kind you drink with; the other kind. On the side with the table, there was also a little cabinet, probably for storing food. In the very back of the house, was a lit fireplace that looked very warm.

"Hey, we were just about to have dinner. You can join us if you want." It was the Bulbasaur who had spoken. I quite honestly was very hungry. I set down my bag in a corner and walked over to the table.

They had prepared a tasty dinner of berries and other fruits. I… probably looked like a Snorlax gobbling all the food down that was in front of me. But hey, I hadn't eaten like this for some time. And the other Pokémon didn't seem to mind.

After dinner, the Charmander and Squirtle started fixing up another bed for me. I was astonished by their kindness. Who wouldn't be? "Hey, we never got your name. My name is Char, and Venus is the Bulbasaur, and Hydro is the Squirtle. So, what's yours?"

I guess it's only natural they would ask a question like that, so I answered. "My name is… Satoshi." "Alright then. So I guess everyone's tired, so we're going to bed soon." Said Char. I nodded. I looked over to the fireplace and saw Hydro just putting it out with a Water Gun.

_Well, saves water I guess._ I thought. I proceeded to help to clean up.

Once everything was cleaned up, we all settled down in our beds. "Good night everyone." I heard Char say. "Good night." Venus and Hydro responded. Soon, everyone was asleep.

…I woke up a few hours later. By then, it had stopped raining. I walked over to the window and saw the full moon high in the sky. (Author's note: BEWARE THE MOON! LOL P.S. sorry couldn't resist) Surrounding the moon were glimmering stars, sparkling the way I do when I'm charging up an electric attack.

_...Maybe… if I stay here, I might finally find it… and my mission will finally be completed… No use worrying about it for now I guess… For now, I'll just take it one day at a time…_

With that, I yawned and went back to sleep.


	2. Chapter 2: A Tour Around Town

Chapter 2

(Char's POV)

I woke up to the rays of sunshine greeting me. I looked over to the other beds and saw Venus, Hydro and Satoshi getting up as well. Satoshi looked like he had rested well. He honestly looked a lot better than he had last night.

"Morning everyone." I said. "Good morning!" Venus and Hydro responded in unison. I was about to ask Satoshi how he felt when I was interrupted by a growling sound. We all turned, surprised expressions, to the sound and found out it was… Satoshi's stomach growling.

Satoshi looked at us with a sheepish grin on his now-red face. The three of us couldn't help but laugh at that. "Sounds like someone's ready for breakfast! Come on guys, let's set up. You can help too, Satoshi." Venus said when we could keep our faces straight.

Still chuckling a little, I proceeded to help them set up. The way we would all do our parts in setting up was: Venus would gather berries and fruits from his garden; Hydro would wash the fruit; and I would cook them. (By now, I was a professional at it.) As for Satoshi, we just had him set the table.

Once everything was prepared, we all just dug in! And, just like last night, Satoshi devoured all of his food in what seemed like 5 seconds. _Just how long has it been since he had a decent meal anyway? _I wondered.

After breakfast was done and everything was put away, we all decided to show Satoshi around town. After all, for all we knew, he could be staying awhile.

We led him to the town square and started to explain the town's layout. "Over here, we have the Persian Bank, where you can deposit Poké. And over here is the Raticate Market. You can buy and sell items there. And over there is the Kangaskhan Storage, where you can store items so they'll be safe. And finally, right over there is the Machoke Dojo, where you can train and become stronger." I said, gesturing to each of the shops as I explained.

He seemed to get everything, which was impressive because it was a lot to take in. Ah, well. What are you gonna do? After we showed him the facilities, we took him to the crossroads, one road leading to town, one leading to our house, and one leading outside of the meadow. (Authors note: kind of like the crossroads in PMD2, Explorers of Time, Darkness and sky.)

It was here I decided to ask a question I had been meaning to ask since last night; what was in Satoshi's bag? "Hey, Satoshi, I've been meaning to ask; what all's in that bag you're always lugging around anyway?"

(Satoshi's POV)

I was surprised he would even notice my bag. And, as usual, I was a bit reluctant to answer. But, I had been helped by these Pokémon so much already, so I guess I owed them that; but I did decide to only show them a little bit.

I set my bag on the ground and opened the flap. "Uh, let's see… there's… my Yellow Scarf… um… my Iron Thorns (99)… uh a couple of Vile Seeds and Violent Seeds… some Quick Seeds… a few random orbs… some berries… and a bunch of other silly little things I've picked up on my travels." I looked to the others.

They looked… um… well, the best way to describe it is dumbstruck. Their eyes were wide, and their mouths were hanging open. I guess they were just amazed at how prepared I was.

"Okay, the one thing I don't understand is, why didn't you just eat some of that when you were hungry?" Hydro asked when he could talk. I replied, "You can't just waste seeds and berries like that when you're in a Mystery Dungeon."

(Char's POV)

When he said 'Mystery Dungeon', I just about jumped to the moon! _That means he's been in Mystery Dungeons before! _I couldn't believe it. All this time we had been waiting, hoping, _praying_ for a way we could learn to be a rescue team, and now, as if by answer, here was someone who could teach us everything we need to know!

My surprised expression quickly turned into an excited one. I had to take a couple minutes to calm myself down before I asked if I could talk to my friends alone. "Uh… sure… I guess…" is what Satoshi said in reply.

He left to go look around the town, leaving me to discuss my new plan to my friends. My friends looked pretty confused as to what was happening.

"Guys, don't you see?! Our prayers have been answered! All we have to do is convince him to teach us what he knows! Once we know all there is to know about exploring, we'll be able to form our own team!"

By now, they seemed to get it, because they looked like they wanted to celebrate too! I couldn't blame them that was exactly how I felt at that moment! After we finished discussing how we were going to convince him, we all simultaneously let out an ecstatic shout, "**YAHOOOO!**"

(Satoshi's POV)

At the time, I had been browsing at the Raticate Market, but as soon as I heard the shout, I went running back to the crossroads. When I got there, I was panting so hard, I couldn't say a whole sentence at once. "Hah… guys… hah… I… hah… heard… hah… a shout… is… hah… everything… HAH… alright?"

"Never been better, pal. Never been better." Answered Char. "Oh… hah… good." I said, still panting as I just collapsed onto my stomach.

"Ha, ha… Come on, we're going back to the house." Said Venus. I slowly got up and started to follow them.

Back at the house, the trio suddenly stopped in front of the door. _? Just what are these three up to anyway?_ Char suddenly turned to me, a serious look on his face. Venus and Hydro soon did the same.

"Satoshi, we need to ask you something important. We've only known you for less than a day, but we know a good Pokémon when we see one. Satoshi… we want you to teach us to be rescuers!"

I was a bit taken aback by this request, but just as I was about to answer…

"Help, HELP!" We ran towards the shout. It was coming from the crossroads.

There, standing at the entrance to a forest, was a Weedle whose face was filled with worry. "Okay, just calm down and tell us what happened." I said, in an attempt to calm it down.

"Okay… Me and Caterpie were playing in the forest, and somehow we got separated, only I didn't notice until I got out of the forest, and when I went back in to try and find her, I couldn't find her, so I went in deeper, and got attacked by a big, scary Pokémon! …So I ran away… Please, PLEASE save Caterpie?"

I looked over to the others. They nodded. "Don't worry, Weedle. We'll help your friend." "You will?! Yay, thank you!"


	3. Chapter 3: Rescues and Requests

Okay, before I get the chapter started, I have a few things to say. I just want to thank those of you who are helping to support my new fanfic; thanks to SunnySummer77, WolfyPup, xXThunderXx, Zander Slade, and PikachuLover14 for following my fanfic. Special thanks to WolfyPup and xXThunderXx, for favoriting my story. And extra-special thanks to PikachuLover14, for writing the first review for my story. Also, glad to have finally fixed that mistake in the previous chapter, it was really quite embarrassing. And now, on to chapter 3!

Chapter 3

(Forest Labyrinth B1f, Satoshi's POV)

I was honestly glad that I had time to think about what my new friends had asked me to do. Did I want to teach them? Was I even going to stick around long enough to do that? _Hmm… but… if I do… they might help lead me to it… Alright, it's decided._ I turned to the others.

"I've thought about your request, and I've made my decision." They all looked at me with nervous anticipation. "I've decided that… I _will_ teach you! As long as I can also be on your team!"

And just like that, they went from incredibly nervous to immensely excited. Looking back on that, it was probably one of the best choices I ever made.

"Alright, so the first things you need to know are the rules of exploring."

"Okay, let's hear them!" Char eagerly responded.

"Okay, but we're a little pressed for time here, so let's keep an eye out for Caterpie on the way. Ahem. Rule No.1, always prepare before going into a dungeon. Rule No.2; gather as much info as you can about your destination before setting out. Rule No.3; always confirm your assignment before setting out. Those are the rules of preparation. Now, for the rules for when you're inside the dungeon. Rule No.4; always check the map to see the layout of the dungeon floor, that way you can see items, enemy Pokémon, and the stairs. Rule No.5; never rush into battle, wait for the enemy to get close to you, or, if necessary, use a long range attack. Rule No.6; only use moves that will aid you in that specific battle. Rule No.7; if you have a status condition, use an item that will help you. Rule No.8; if you're low on items, try not to use too many, or try to use the remaining items effectively. Try and take all that in, and let's find that Caterpie!"

"YEAH!"

B1f and all we found was 35 Poké and an Oran Berry. Not to mention a territorial Tangela. We went on to the second floor.

B2f and all that was there was 16 more Poké, a Heal Seed, and a Bellsprout. We moved to the next floor.

…About half an hour later, no sign of Caterpie. We were at b3f by now, and had kept an eye out the whole way… and all we had found were some Blast seeds and a couple of agitated Paras and Exeggcute. Having the best hearing, I kept my ears open the whole way, so to speak. But, nothing.

B4f and still, all we found was just some apples and sticks and sleeping enemies. We were thinking about going home and trying again tomorrow, when I heard what sounded like a scream coming from the next floor. I told the others and we dashed towards the stairs.

B5f was the last floor, and when we arrived, well, we were pretty shocked at what we saw. Caterpie was at the other side of the 'room', cowering in fear, because in front of it was a huge Pinsir with a menacing look on its face.

"H-Help me…"

"Get ready to fight guys." I said as the Pinsir turned to us and let out a battle cry!

"WROOOAAARRR!"

(Char's POV)

I felt like I was going to burst from excitement! We were about to fight our very first Boss Battle! We all awaited commands from Satoshi, who had kind of become the leader during this adventure.

"Venus, Hydro, Poison Powder and Bubble!" he called out. Hydro took a deep breath and blew out a barrage of bubbles, while Venus released purple powder from his bulb onto the Pinsir.

I noticed two changes in the Pinsir's movement; first, the Pinsir was moving slower than before, and it looked like it was in immense pain. _Right, Bubble has a chance of slowing the enemy, and Poison Powder poisons the enemy. _

In other words, the Pinsir would slowly take damage, and we would have more opportunities to attack.

"Char, you and I will eat these, and then both attack at the same time!"

Satoshi held up two Violent Seeds, which maximizes Attack and Special Attack. I took one out of his paw, and we both ate ours. Immediately I was filled with so much new power!

"Ready?!"

I nodded. We charged up our attacks, and let them loose with of our might!

"FLAMETHROWER!"

"THUNDERBOLT!"

A huge dust cloud descended over the battlefield. I couldn't see anything; I had to close my eyes to keep dust from getting in them. When the dust settled, I looked over to the Pinsir, who was on the ground, and covered horn to toe in ash. It had fainted. We had won.

I looked over at my teammates. They were all exhausted, but satisfied too.

"We did it, guys. We did it."

(Satoshi's POV)

We had done it, together. I felt like celebrating, but we had more important matters to attend to. I walked over to the little shaken-up Caterpie. I crouched down and made eye contact with the tiny worm Pokémon, and said "Hey, it's okay. You're safe now. Come on, let's head back, okay?"

"O-okay…"

And we all started to walk back home.

(Back at the crossroads)

"Caterpie!"

"Weedle!"

We watched as the two bug types started circling each other in happiness and relief.

"I'm so glad you're okay!"

"So am I!"

"CATERPIE!" said a new voice. We turned and saw it had come from a Butterfree.

"That's Caterpie's mother," Char whispered into my ear. That would explain why it had tears in its eyes. It flew up to the Caterpie and proceeded to hug it. I was touched by this happy scene.

It was then that I felt something I hadn't felt in a long time; true happiness. For that one moment, all was right with the world.

"I don't know how I could ever possibly thank you enough for saving my daughter. This… isn't much, but it's the least I could do to thank you."

She set down a little sack, and then walked—err, flew off with Caterpie and Weedle tagging along behind her, with Weedle walking right beside Caterpie—he wasn't taking any more chances.

I peered into the sack, and inside was… 250 Poké, 10 Gravelerocks, and a Ginseng! These were some pretty good items.

"Alright, we're going to be an official rescue team, have someone on the team who can teach us all we need to know, not to mention we just completed our first rescue, won our first Boss Battle, and got some pretty choice rewards! I'd say that calls for a celebration!" Hydro was the one who had said that. Seems he's the fun-loving type.

"H-hey, everybody just hold on a second!" Venus said, looking like he had just remembered something important. "There are still a few things left to take care of before we start celebrating. But, once everything's done, I'll pay for lunch at that new café that just opened near the dojo."

"Aw… we have to wait to celebrate? You're no fun…" Hydro said, but I could tell he was just teasing.

(Back at the house)

Standing at the door was a Pidgeotto, with a bag slung around its shoulder. It opened its beak and spoke, "Word got around that you four are forming a team. Well, all you gotta do is write down your team name on this document, and I'll fly it over to the Rescue Team Federation, or R.T.F. for short, and they'll register you as an official team!"

I looked to my friends; they were all looking like they might burst from excitement.

"Okay, what's our team's name going to be?" Char asked.

Both Venus and Hydro were silent. So, I decided to give them a suggestion.

"How about… the KantoPals?"

The three of them looked at each other for a second, and then Char said,

"It's… perfect!" and Hydro and Venus seemed to agree. He wrote it down on the document, and gave it to Pidgeotto. He put it in his bag and prepared to take off.

"Oh, one more thing. See this signboard? From now on, it will serve as your Bulletin Board. Pokémon from around town will give me Job Requests, and I will post them on the board."

"Alright, thanks, Pidgeotto." I said. And he flew off. I looked at the Bulletin Board and saw that there were already four job requests posted on it. I took them off the board and showed them to the team.

"Yeah, I think we have time for that. They're all in a nearby cave called Geo Cavern. We can get ready for the missions and then wait for Pidgeotto to get back with our team badges!" We all agreed, except Hydro was still hungry.

(Tranquil Town)

We put our unneeded items in the storage, bought a Health Orb at the market, and deposited the rest of our money in the bank. I gathered Intel on the dungeon we were going to go to, and once I had all the information I wanted, we went to the new Mr. Mime Café (Venus paid for the food) and once we had completely prepared, we headed back to the house, (which was now the base) and waited for Pidgeotto.

We had just gotten back, when we heard the sound of wings flapping. Then, Pidgeotto landed on the Bulletin Board, with something in his bag.

"Hey, just in time. Here are your official team badges!" He pulled out four white oval-shaped badges that had little wings on each side, and handed them to us.

"Alright! But, where are we supposed to put them?" Char seemed confused as to what to do with them. I, however, had just the thing. I reached into my bag and pulled out four scarves; one yellow, one red, one green, and one deep blue.

I handed one to each of my friends (Hydro got the green one, Venus got the red one, Char got the yellow one, and, as I always do, I took the deep blue one.) I then fastened each badge to a scarf.

"Hey, perfect! Now, let's go do those missions!" Char said with enthusiasm.

(Geo Cavern B1f, Venus' POV)

The cavern was an easier place for Hydro and I to fight in. Well, there were a lot of Rock Types, and based on type matchup, we had the biggest advantage. At the moment, we just focused on getting to the B3f. Once we found the stairs, we moved on to B2f.

(Geo Cavern B2f)

We only found an angry Geodude which I knocked out with one Vine Whip. We had landed in the room with the stairs, so we just moved on.

(Geo Cavern B3f)

This was the first floor we had a job to do on in this dungeon. We had to search for… an Apple. I know what you're thinking; 'An Apple? That's a bit silly…' That's exactly what I said. But, what are you gonna do?

After a bit of searching, we found it in the same room as the stairs, picked it up and went on to the fourth basement floor.

(Geo Cavern B4f)

On this floor, we had to deliver a Stun Seed to a Shellder who had lost his. Unfortunately, the Shellder was on the water, so we couldn't get to it. However, Satoshi gave the Stun Seed to Hydro and told him to give it to Shellder. It was actually quite a clever plan. Once that was done, we went on to the next floor.

(Geo Cavern B5f)

On this floor, we had to search for a lost Doduo. He didn't take long to find. However, getting him to trust us, that's a different story. He was so scared he thought we were enemies. So we basically had to chase him around awhile until he couldn't run anymore and that took a long time… I'd rather not talk about it… Anyway, when we had finally gotten him out of the dungeon, we proceeded to the next floor.

(Geo Cavern B6f, Char's POV)

On this floor, we had to arrest a trouble-making Graveler. When we spotted him, we prepared to battle. Venus fired a Razor Leaf, and Hydro loosed a Water Gun. I used a move I had just recently learned; Metal Claw! I had no idea what Satoshi could do in this battle; until I saw his tail had started to turn a shiny silver color. When it was completely silver, he flung it at the Graveler, which knocked it out! He knew Iron Tail!

We warped the Graveler out of the dungeon using the badges, and then escaped using the same method.

(Back at the Base, Satoshi's POV)

We got thanked and rewarded by each of the Pokémon we helped, and received a bounty from officer Magneton for apprehending Graveler. For the first three missions, we received 450 Poké each. For the last one, we got a whopping 600 Poké! In total, we made 1,950 Poké! It had been a pretty satisfying day, alright.

And as if that weren't enough, an amazing thing happened! The color of our badges changed from white to bronze!

"Okay, now this _definitely _calls for a celebration!" said Hydro.

We all celebrated by partying till midnight! Char prepared an excellent meal, which we devoured heartily. We played games, like Pin the Tail on the Ponyta, and pretty much did whatever we wanted! After hours of that, we all finally went to bed.


	4. Chapter 4: Shadows of a Mystery

Me: Just a couple things before I start the chapter; again, thanks to those of you who are helping to support my fanfic. Oh, and I know some of you find it unnecessary to go through dungeons floor by floor, and I respect that, but I find that if it isn't labeled, I tend to forget which floor they're on. Sorry. Now, in this chapter, were going to start introducing Satoshi's past.

Satoshi: Whoop-de-do. (Sarcastically)

Me: Ah! W-where did you come from?

Satoshi: *sigh* You know me—always like to keep on top of things.

Me: Heh, heh. Right… sorry.

Satoshi: *sigh* that's alright; it was bound to happen sooner or later.

Me: …Anyway… I don't own Pokémon. Let's just start the chapter before this gets any more awkward than it already is.

Chapter 4

(Satoshi's POV)

For the next few weeks, we focused on helping Pokémon in need by doing Job Requests. During that time, we all got stronger and leveled up until we were ready for the tougher dungeons. (We had also checked out that Machoke Dojo.)

We soon reached Silver Rank, and not long after that, we received a Challenge Letter from a team called Team Shellshock, made up of a Cloyster and two Shellder.

We were able to beat them, but they did knock out Char and give us a good fight. Honestly, I was just glad they didn't hit his tail. Afterwards, we continued to complete Requests, rescuing, escorting, and delivering. That sort of thing. And I enjoyed it. Perhaps a bit too much, because for a while it made me forget about my mission… although I wish I hadn't… because one night…

(Nightmare)

"_Come on, you Slowpoke!"_

"_Don't you mean Slowbro?"_

"_Very funny you two!"_

…

"…_Wait."_

"_? What's wrong?"_

"_I don't know… but something's… just not right…"_

_*rustle rustle*_

"…_! What the…"_

_*TROMP*_

"_Grrrrrrr…"_

"…_?..."_

"_Satoshi… this is kind of scary…"_

"_Shhh…."_

"_GRRRRrrrrr….."_

_*TROMP, TROMP, TROMP*_

"…_! Stay close and stay quiet… let's get the rest of the little ones and get out of here…"_

"_O-okay…"_

…_.._

_*growling and stomping stops*_

"…_? Either we lost it… or…"_

"_WRRRROOOOOAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRR!"_

"_Waaahhhh! What _is _that?!"_

"_Satoshi… what do we do?!"_

"… _Split up and run, and whatever you do, don't lead it back home! And if you get in trouble, just call for me."_

…

"_Alright…. Just what are you doing in our forest….?"_

"_GGRRRRR!?"_

"…_.. Have they spotted me?"_

"…_..WRRROOOAAAAAARRRRRRRRRR!"_

"_WRROOOAAAARRRR!"_

"_M-more of them?!"_

"_GRRRRRRRRRRR!"_

"_Wha-? Where are they…! No! The little ones!"_

…

"_Hah…. Hah…. Hah…. Where… where is everyone…Don't tell me… am I… too late?... Star?! Song?! Joy?! Lee?! Smooch?! Plug?! Mortar?! No…"_

…

_*crash*_

"_Whoa! That was close! They're destroying everything… I've got to find the others and get out of here!"_

"…_Aaaaaaaah! S-Satoshi, help me!"_

"_Serena! I'm coming!"_

"_SATOSHIIIII!" _

"_SERENA!"_

…_.._

"…_No… I-I've got to f-find Caruso…"_

"_Caruso! Caruso, where are you?!"_

"_B-big brother?"_

"_Caruso?!"_

"_Big brother… h-help me…"_

"_Caruso, hang on! I'm coming!"_

"…_Huh?…AAAAAAAH! BIG BROTHEEEERRRRR!"_

"_**NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!**__"_

I woke up panting and sweating like crazy. I was sitting straight up in bed, with that 'scared out of your wits' feeling people get when they wake up from a nightmare. After a minute I had calmed myself down… a little bit. In almost an instant, I went from terrified to miserable.

Having been reminded of that horrible memory… My ears drooped down, and tears filled my eyes. With tears running down my face, I slowly made my way over to the corner by the door of the house I kept my bag in.

Making sure not to wake up the others, I opened the bag and reached into a secret pocket. I pulled out two items, a Prism Ruff and a Shocker Cape. These two items were very important to me… They were my treasures… My mementos…

I walked back over to the bed and held the items the way a child holds a doll or stuffed animal and began gently stroking them. My tears dripped down onto the items as I continued to cry. I buried my face into my items and eventually just cried myself to sleep. Little did I know Char had been awake listening to me.

(Char's POV)

Why had he been crying? What kind of nightmare could be so bad it made him act like that? _More importantly, just what is his story? He must have a memory so terrible linked to those items and that nightmare… Hmmm… Well I guess he'll tell us when he's ready. Either that or I'll _make_ him tell me._

With that, I went back to sleep.

(The next morning)

I woke up and stretched, and looked over to my friends and saw them waking up as well. Remembering events last night, I became concerned about Satoshi. He seemed to be fine, although I knew perfectly well that looks can be deceiving. I shrugged it off, for now, and helped with breakfast.

(Tranquil Town)

After breakfast, we went to town as usual. Prepared for requests, as usual. We did a little training at the dojo, as usual. (This had pretty much become part of the routine.)The only thing different at the moment was that Satoshi had been awfully quiet the whole morning.

It was then that Hydro asked for me. "Hey, Satoshi, you okay? You haven't said, well, a word all morning."

"Huh? Oh, I'm fine. Just didn't get much sleep last night." _Yeah, maybe because you were crying your eyes out!_ I shook it off nonetheless, and we headed back to check the requests on the board.

(Back at the Base)

We took some Job Requests for a place called Rigged Peak, a tall mountain not far from the Labyrinth Forest. I was still concerned about Satoshi, but again, I set that worry aside so I could focus on work.

(Rigged Peak 1f)

At the moment we just had to focus on getting to 5f. Most of us were only focusing on work, however, Satoshi was… well… the best word for it is distracted. He even ran into a wall because he wasn't even looking where he was going… that had to hurt… When we finally found the stairs we just went on to the next floor.

(Rigged Peak 2f)

We just landed in the room with the stairs, and moved to the next floor.

(Rigged Peak 3f)

We found the stairs shortly after dealing with a Machop with anger issues. We moved on after picking up a Silver Spike (3).

(Rigged Peak 4f)

We found a Big Apple, and 46 Poké, found the stairs in the third room we searched, and went to the first 'Destination Floor'.

(Rigged Peak 5f)

On this floor, we had to rescue a Psyduck who had forgotten his way back home and gotten lost. We began searching for him, but as I said before, Satoshi wasn't paying attention, so he somehow managed to trip on something and started tumbling down a hill. We just sweat dropped as we watched him keep rolling down. But, in a way, it was a good thing. Because he landed at the bottom of the hill, which happened to be where the Psyduck was, we were able to get him out of the dungeon. We moved on.

(Rigged Peak 6f)

On this floor, we had to deliver a Rebound Orb to a smart Abra who wanted to test its effects for himself. Luckily, we had received one as a reward for defeating Team Shellshock. However, it took a while to find the Abra, as it kept teleporting away from us. Finally, we were able to get it to hold still so we could give it the orb. Once that was done, we went on to the seventh floor.

(Rigged Peak 7f, Hydro's POV)

Here, we had to 'calm down' a rampaging Dugtrio who had been digging pitfalls on the mountain. I figured that just meant to knock some sense into him by KO-ing him. When we found him, I told Char and Satoshi to wait in the corridor and leave the fighting to Venus and I. We easily beat it, but he got a Sand Attack in, and I got sand in my shell! It was so itchy! After the Dugtrio came to, he apologized for rampaging and promised not to do it again. And for getting sand in my shell. After that, we left the dungeon.

(Back at the Base, Satoshi's POV)

When we got back, I was surprised we had finished so early, but that could have just been because I had been distracted. Anyway, we got thanked by each of the Pokémon we helped and received 700 Poké in total! After that, we got started on dinner right after Hydro got back from the river nearby, something about washing sand out.

After dinner, everyone looked pretty tired and ready for bed. I, however, was reluctant to go to sleep, afraid the nightmare would return… I eventually became too tired to even argue about it… and I turned out to be right…

(An hour later, Char's POV)

I had waited for an hour, staying awake to see what would happen. And finally, he had the same reaction he did last night. I felt so bad for him, and I wanted to help, but I couldn't until I knew the problem. And it seemed there was only one way I could find out; asking him.

(Satoshi's POV)

I was stroking my Prism Ruff and Shocker Cape, just like last night, and humming a lullaby from my childhood. I wasn't even aware of the Charmander behind me until he made his presence known. "Ahem."

"Oh, d-did I wake you up?"

"No, I was already awake. Listen, we need to talk. Let's go outside."

_? What's he up to? _I thought suspiciously.

(Outside the Base)

"Alright, what did you want to talk about?"

"I want to talk about you. I want to know about your nightmares."

This took me by surprise.

"N-nightmares? What nightmares?"

He put a serious look on his face.

"You _know_ what I'm talking about. I know you've been having nightmares these past few nights, and I want to know why."

Naturally, I tried to avoid talking about it.

"It's pretty late. Why don't we talk about this some other time?"

I tried to make my way back to the door of the base, when I was stopped by a claw on my shoulder.

"Satoshi. I know something's wrong. I want to help you. I can't help you if you don't tell me what's wrong!" He was practically shouting now.

"…I…I…I…..I just can't."

He took his claw off my shoulder and allowed me to move. Neither of us said another word after that.

(The next morning)

I woke up along with the others. We had breakfast and began to head into town. I didn't say a word to Char, though.

(Tranquil Town)

We did the normal routine, stored items, browsed, deposited money, trained, and headed back to the Base. Again, Char and I didn't say a word to each other.

(Back at the Base)

When we got back, we noticed that the Bulletin Board was completely blank. We were wondering what the matter was when we heard wings flapping. (Say that five times fast!) Pidgeotto had landed on the Bulletin Board with a worried expression on his face.

"There are no requests from villagers today, because I've got one for you. See, my little brother, Pidgey, has gone missing. I woke up, and he was just… gone! But he hasn't gotten lost, oh no. He's been… Poké-napped! And whoever did it left this in Pidgey's room."

He set down a note of some sort. Char picked it up and began to read it out loud.

_If you ever want to see your little brother again, send Team KantoPals to the depths of Poison Valley. One of my cohorts will be… waiting for them there. But, send only those four, or… heh, heh; I'd hate to see what might happen to your poor little brother._

_-Clone _

Needless to say, when he read 'Clone', I thought I might faint.

"Oh, the poor little Pidgey. Just who does this 'Clone' guy think he is?!"

"Clone… is an awful lab experiment of a Pokémon whose heart is twisted for evil…" I said with my fists clenched. The others turned to me.

"You… know this guy?" Char asked. At least he was talking to me.

"Grrrrrrr….. Unfortunately….. I'll explain more later, I promise. Come on! We're going to Poison Valley!"

"YEAH!"


	5. Chapter 5: Poisonous Enemies

Me: Alright, again, thanks to those of you supporting my fanfic. Don't forget to read and review! Anyway, sorry it took so long to get the previous chapter up; I was taking a bit of a break. So, Satoshi's not around, it seems, so I can talk without feeling awkward. So, in this chapter, our heroes have gone off to save the little Pidgey from the evil villain, Clone. Gee, I wonder what kind of Pokémon he is. Hmm. So anyway, I don't own—

Satoshi: Boo!

Me: Aah! *falls backwards in surprise* Ugh! I don't own Pokémon. Let's just start the chapter.

Chapter 5

(Poison Valley B1f, Satoshi's POV)

We were making our way through the poison-drenched valley, saving Pidgey the only thing on our minds. Well, that and probably 'who the heck is this Clone guy, and how does Satoshi know him?' was probably what they were thinking.

I just couldn't believe it; after all these years, Clone had finally reached the area that Tranquil Town was in; the Valley of Peace. I had been traveling around long enough to know the valley had always been, well, untouchable.

And why had he waited until now to strike? Had he just recently found this place? No, that's impossible, he can see everything. And I know he can't resist an easy target, so why? A whole valley that had evaded him for so long, I'd think that he would have struck a long time ago.

I kept thinking of possible reasons… until I noticed we had reached the stairs.

(B2f)

We were pushing on through the poison-soaked terrain. We ran into a few Grimer, but I simply used a Thunder Bolt to knock them all out at once. At the moment, I had dropped the nagging question in my mind and focused on hurrying to the depths of the dungeon to save Pidgey.

"Come on, guys, the stairs are probably right… over… here… Oh, come on! A Monster House? In a place like this? Ugh, let's just get this over with."

We kept going until we just had to stop and rest, we had, in total, fought 20 Grimer, 16 Bellsprout, 27 Zubat, 19 Koffing, 17 Tentacool, 37 Nidoran, (Both Male _and_ Female) and 8 Venomoth. Now do you see why it's called Poison Valley? By then, we had gotten to the Midway Point.

We had gone up 14 floors, and based on what I had heard, we only had a few floors to go. We had used up almost all our Pecha Berries just getting this far. We had also run into 7 Monster Houses, 10 Traps, and Char had even swallowed some poison accidentally.

"Hah… this… is just… not our day." Char was right, sort of.

"… No. Luck… has nothing to do with it… It's Clone… He's messing with us, trying to see if we're strong enough to get past his 'tests'… He spared no expenses setting this up…"

"…Okay, you know how you said you'd 'explain more later'? Well, it's later now."

"Eh… I'll… explain everything after we rescue Pidgey, okay?"

"…Fine…"

"Well, I think we've rested long enough. Let's keep going."

We moved on to Deep Poison Valley.

I wouldn't have believed it if I hadn't seen it for myself, but the depths of the valley were even filthier than the first part! Oh, well. We trudged on, honestly just wanting this adventure to be over. I was still a little reluctant to talk about my past… but I shoved the thought aside so I could focus. I definitely didn't want to fall into the poison.

(I'm just going to skip to the end of the dungeon, because, spoiler alert, there's going to be a long fight at the end. Sorry, I'm just not in the right mood today if you know what I mean.)

(Poison Valley Depths)

We had finally reached the end of the dungeon. We were all exhausted, but tried not to show it. We walked over to the edge of the 'room' and saw… Pidgey tied up and gagged with a muzzle. Behind it was a large, menacing Arbok with a malicious grin on its face. It opened its mouth and showed its fangs and forked tongue. I assumed that this was the 'cohort' that had been waiting for us.

"Am I right to assume you have been waiting for us?"

"Dependssssss. Am _I_ right to asssssssume that you are Team KantoPalsssss?"

I nodded. We went into Battle Position.

"Hmm. Ssssso, I wassss correct. My Masssster, Clone, ssssent me to meet you here. Now, let'sssss get down to busssinesssss. To get the little appetizer—I mean Pidgey back, all you need to do isssss defeat ussss in a battle."

"Uh, 'us'?"

"SSSSSSSSssssssss!"

Before we knew what was happening, we were surrounded by Ekans who looked hungry. We knew our odds of winning weren't very good, but we had to at least try.

"Guys, get ready…"

I started out by using Quick Attack on an Ekans a distance from me, stunning it. Although, it only seemed to make it mad, because immediately it coiled around me, bared its fangs and bit me right in the stomach!

"Aaarrrgh!" I felt myself getting weaker and weaker… until I opened my eyes to find that Char had knocked it out with a Fire Fang! I stood up; shot a glance at Char that hopefully said 'Thanks.' Apparently it did, because he acknowledged a smile and went back to the battle.

(Char's POV)

I was glad Satoshi was okay, but the gash in his stomach didn't look too good. I decided to save worry for after the battle. I went back to fighting. I took several Ekans out with a Fire Spin attack, leaving just a bunch of roasted reptiles.

I looked to the others and saw they were doing well. Venus kept the Ekans tied down with a Vine Whip, while Hydro took them out with Water Pulses. By now there were only seven left. I wondered what we could do, when they were all knocked out at once by what seemed to be a Discharge attack. I simply decided I would ask later.

"Bravo, bravo! Massssterfully done, my dear KantoPalssss. But now, the real tesssst beginsss." The Arbok prepared to strike, and we went back to Battle Position.

"Hmm. Now why do I get the feeling I've forgotten-! Of courssse! I'm forgetting thisss!" He held up a purple orb with his tail. I wondered what it could be, when Satoshi answered for me.

"A Toxic Orb, am I right?"

"Correct. And I am assssuming you alssso know what happenssss when I do thissss?!" He bit down into it, shattering the orb and drenching his fangs in a dark purple substance.

(Satoshi's POV)

"Guys, be very careful! If you mix an Arbok's venom with the venom from a Toxic Orb, you get Black Poison!"

"Black Poison?"

"A very rare and very deadly poison. One bite and you're dead."

"Hmm, you are asss sssmart asss they ssssay. Now, who will be the tessst sssubject? Ah, I know! I haven't had a hot meal in a long time!"

I realized he was talking about Char, and I just panicked. I saw Arbok lunge forward, and knew I needed to do something. I was even willing to take the hit for him; anything to keep this from happening! But I didn't move. I was paralyzed… by fear… No matter how much effort I thought I put in, my body wouldn't do what I told it to do. I thought it would be the end of my new friend, but Venus jumped in front of Char and took the hit…

"VENUS!"

"Don't worry, I'm okay!"

"WHAAAAT?! You're sssuppossed to be dead!"

"Sorry, half Poison Type!"

Right. Forgot about that. I got my focus back, and we all simultaneously attacked together!

"Water Pulse!"

"Bullet Seed!"

"Fire Spin!"

"Thunder Bolt!"

There was a medium sized explosion, and a cloud of dust had covered the battlefield. We all held our breathe until the dust settled and revealed the Arbok knocked out flat on the ground. We all let out a relieved sigh. I walked over to the captive Pidgey and untied it, to find myself tackled with a desperate hug. I soothingly stroked its feathers until it calmed down.

"Come on; let's get you back to your brother."

"Okay!"

(Back at the Base)

We watched as the two bird Pokémon hopped up to each other and wrapped their wings around each other, happy and relieved to be reunited. I was touched by this. I was sure the rest of the team was too, but I also knew what I had promised to the team.

"Thank you so much! We'll see you tomorrow!" And they flew off.

My friends turned to me. I knew I wasn't getting out of it this time. I might as well acknowledge my defeat, as it were.

"I know, I know. Time for me to come clean. But it might take a while to tell, so get comfortable."

"Hey, I don't care if it takes all night. We're not going anywhere."

"…Alright. Here goes…"

Me: And that ends Chapter 5. What'd you guys think?

Chokka: The dungeon could've been better, but overall, it was pretty good.

Buizel: I liked it!

Pika: Me too!

Kala: Same here!

Aerodactyl: Not bad, not bad.

Donphan: *nods in agreement*

Courage: You did very well.

Me: Thanks guys! Oh, and just to clear something up, these guys aren't going to be part of this fanfic. These guys are my Pokémon! And, so as not to cause any confusion, Courage is a Braviary, Chokka is a male Umbreon, Donphan is, obviously, a male Donphan, Aerodactyl is a male Aerodactyl, Kala is a female Fenekin, Buizel is a male Buizel, and Pika is a female SHINY Pikachu! Anyhoo, in the next chapter… *looks around the room* Satoshi will finally confess about his past. And hopefully, we can end this awkward thing between us. So, please Read and Review! BraviaryGirl7 out!


	6. Chapter 6: Satoshi's Past

Me: Okay, I just think we got off on the wrong foot here. I swear I didn't know you were in the room at the time, so why don't we end this… awkward thing, okay?

Satoshi: Hmm… okay.

Buizel: Psst! We're on!

Me: Oh! Thanks Buizel! Ahem. So, a few things I forgot to mention, you probably know this, but I made up that thing about Black Poison. I thought it would make a good story, so yeah. Oh, and about the shortness of chapters, I promise I'll make the chapters longer. Okay, what else…?

Buizel: *hops on a chair and whispers in my ear*

Me: Oh, right! And I will be busy with school now, so don't expect one chapter a day anymore. More like one chapter a week, hopefully. Notice that I said 'hopefully' so it's not guaranteed. Yeah… Anyway, this is the chapter where Satoshi… eh, I'm just going to let him explain if he wants.

Satoshi: Thank you. Now, as she was saying, you're finally going to find out about my past. Time for me to come clean. But, I got to warn you, it's a pretty sad story.

Me: Yes, yes it is. *sighs*

Chokka: Phineas and Ferb reference? Really?

Me: What? It's just supposed to be funny so as the viewers aren't completely crushed by the sad story. Oh, one more thing, if you read this while listening to Desperation (Super Light Arrangement, PMD3) it really makes it that much sadder. Anyway, can someone do the disclaimer so we don't keep the fans waiting anymore?

Buizel: BraviaryGirl7 does not own Pokémon.

Me: Good job, Buizel. Now, without further ado, Chapter 6.

Chapter 6

(Satoshi's POV)

"Alright, here goes."

(Flashback)

_I was born in a beautiful forest called Emerald Forest. I grew up with my parents, two Raichu, my best friend, Serena the Eevee and my little brother, Caruso the Pichu. When I was 6, my parents left to reform their rescue team. And I don't mean reform like change and make better. I mean like get the team back together. See, before I was born, they had been on a very famous rescue team, but retired so they could raise a family. The rest of their old team had also retired to raise families. So one day…_

"_What do you mean you're leaving?" I was just surprised that they were going away._

"_Satoshi, listen. We just have to leave for a while."_

"_But why?"_

"_Because there are troubling signs. Storm clouds are growing."_

"_But… there's not a cloud in the sky." They both chuckled a bit and resumed talking._

"_That's not exactly what we meant. You'll understand when you're older."_

"…_Okay…"_

"_Take care of all the other little ones, okay?"_

"_Okay!"_

_I hugged them, and they set off along with the rest of their old team; a Wigglytuff, a Clefable, a Hitmonlee, a Jynx, an Electabuzz, and a Magmar. And so… I was left in charge of 7 little ones. Serena and I took care of them for a few weeks, when…_

_It was a stormy night, just like the night we met. We had put the rest of the little ones to bed and were looking after Caruso._

"_They're all growing so fast, aren't they?"_

"_They sure are, Serena. Huh? What was that?"_

"_What was what?"_

"_I could've sworn I heard someone at the door… but now…"_

"_Well, there's only one way to find out. Open the door."_

"_Right. Um, maybe you should come with me." She rolled her eyes and smiled. We went up to the door, when we heard a voice behind us._

"_Um… w-what's going on?" I turned around and saw a small Tyrouge standing in the door to the hall on the other side of the room._

"_Lee? Aren't you supposed to be in bed?"_

"_Well, I was, but the others wouldn't settle down because of the storm, and so I decided to ask and make sure that it was going to end soon."_

_I looked at Serena and we both smiled._

"_Well why don't you get the others and we can all wait for the storm to go away together."_

_Lee smiled and ran back to his and the others' room._

"_So, where were we? Oh, yeah! Checking outside. Let's go."_

_I opened the door, looked out onto the porch, and saw a medium size basket with a wrapped-up blanket and a note attached to it. 'What could this be?' I thought as I picked it up by the handle at carried it inside._

"_What's in there?" Serena asked me._

"_I have no idea. Let's find out, shall we?"_

_I gently unwrapped the blanket and looked inside. And in the basket was a white egg with red and blue triangles dotted around it. I was even more confused than before. I took the note and read it aloud._

"_I'm afraid I don't have much time to explain, all you must know is that you must take care of this egg. Please, believe me when I say that I don't want to abandon it, but I'm afraid I have no choice but to leave it in your care. I know you will take good care of it, and perhaps one day I will reveal myself to you. And, I have already decided on a name for it; Joy."_

"_That's all it says… well, I guess we'll just have to take care of it."_

_At that moment, Lee came back in the room followed by five other Pokémon; Star the female Cleffa, Song the female Igglybuff, Smooch the Smoochum, Plug the male Elekid, and Mortar the male Magby. Each of them was only a few weeks old, but learning fast, as you can see. _

"_Hey, what's that? An egg? Can we see?" We let them look as long as they were careful with it. _

"_Are you gonna take care of it?"_

"_Well, yeah. At least until we can find its real parents. This, according to the note, could be a long time from now." _

"_At least I won't be the youngest anymore!" My little brother had been so cute. Despite his extremely cheerful nature, and being the youngest by a few days, he was actually the smartest of the young ones. _

_Each of the kids wore a different pendent which originally belonged to their parents; Star wore a Fallen Star, Song wore a Fluff Dust, Smooch wore a Chic Shard, Plug wore a Yellow Jewel, Mortar wore a Red Jewel, Lee wore a Heroic Medal, and Caruso wore a Thunder Shard. _

_I noticed that along with the egg and note, there was also an item called an Egg Shard in the basket. I decided to give it to the baby Pokémon when it hatched. And after a few days, it hatched into a female Togepi, which we named Joy. The egg-shaped shard on a string was then given to the newborn Pokémon. _

_The next 2 years, we raised the kids and taught them what my parents had taught me about exploring. We fed them all Gummies to help enhance their I.Q. Looking back; it's hard to remember where we got all those Gummies. We all grew up and grew stronger together like a great big family. It was literally the best time of my life! But… one day…_

_It started out normally. I woke up with the others, we had breakfast, and Serena Caruso and I went outside for a walk. Well, it was more like a run. And I was losing._

"_Come on, you Slowpoke!"_

"_Don't you mean Slowbro?"_

"_Very funny you two!"_

_However, I felt that something was out of sorts that morning. _

"…_Wait."_

"_? What's wrong?"_

"_I don't know… but something's… just not right…"_

_Suddenly, we heard a noise coming from a distance._

_*rustle rustle*_

"…_! What the…"_

_*TROMP*_

"_Grrrrrrr…"_

"…_?..." _

"_Satoshi… this is kind of scary…"_

"_Shhh…."_

"_GRRRRrrrrr…"_

_*TROMP, TROMP, TROMP*_

_I had no idea what was going on, all I knew was we had to get out of there._

"…_! Stay close and stay quiet… let's get the rest of the little ones and get out of here…"_

"_O-okay…"_

_We quietly inched our way back home, thinking we had escaped our follower. But just when we thought we were safe…_

"_WRRRROOOOOAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRR!"_

_What jumped out of the shrub was some kind of coal black dragon with huge white claws and teeth! It stood on all fours as it stared at us, arrow shaped tail twitching back and forth!_

"_Waaahhhh! What _is _that?!"_

"_Satoshi… what do we do?!"_

_I had to keep cool under fire as the saying goes, and went with the most logical thing I could think of._

"… _Split up and run, and whatever you do, don't lead it back home! And if you get in trouble, just call for me!"_

_We all ran as fast as we could in different directions, hoping we would lose it. Meanwhile, I decided I would try and find out what this creature was up to. I followed it as stealthily as I could, and when it stopped, I hid in a bush and watched. I was muttering to myself about what it could be up to, when it turned in my direction. I stopped talking hoping it would forget me. When I thought it had forgotten about me, it suddenly let out another roar! And, as if in reply, several other similar roars sounded behind me! I heard a shuffling sound, and suddenly three more of them appeared! They released some kind of black fire from their mouths, burning everything around them almost instantly! _

_Then, they all bounded towards the house! I ran as fast as I could, but… I was too late… when I got there, everything was destroyed and I couldn't find the little ones… I went to try and find Serena and Caruso…_

_I ran to find them, and a tree nearly fell on top of me!_

"_Whoa! That was close! They're destroying everything… I've got to find the others and get out of here!"_

_Suddenly, I heard a shout!_

"… _Aaaaaaaah! S-Satoshi, help me!"_

"_Serena! I'm coming!"_

_But I was too late._

"_SATOSHIIIII!"_

"_SERENA!"_

_I waited, hoping to hear her again… but nothing… Even though I was sad, bordering on crushed, I knew I had to find Caruso…_

"_Caruso! Caruso, where are you?!"_

"_B-big brother?"_

"_Caruso?!"_

"_Big brother… h-help me…"_

"_Caruso, hang on! I'm coming!"_

"…_Huh? …AAAAAAAH! BIG BROTHEEEERRRRR!"_

"_**NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!**__"_

_I couldn't take it anymore. The creatures had left, the fire had stopped, and everything was quiet and still. Gone. I was curled like I was asleep, but I was crying for what seemed like hours. The only things I had left were Serena's Prism Ruff, and Caruso's Shocker Cape._

_I held the items protectively while still crying and crying. Suddenly, I looked up and noticed a brilliant light had appeared in front of me and began to take form into a cat-like shape. Floating in front of me, the white cat Pokémon looked back at me with its light blue eyes. It was none other than the legendary Mew! It then spoke to me._

"_I understand that you have suffered a great loss, however, I am afraid that I must ask for your help. I know who is behind this disaster. His name… is Clone. He wants nothing more than complete destruction of the world. He set this up, not just because he wants to, but because you are the one destined to stop him."_

"_But… how do you know it's me?"_

"_There is an ancient prophecy that goes like this: The Darkness shall threaten all that is good and light. The Fire of Black shall devour the hope. However, when things are at their darkest, the heroes shall rise and quell the Darkness with the most powerful lights! Most of the prophecy has been lost, however I remember this part: A Pure Hearted Electric Type with an electrified resolve. An energetic Fire Type with a burning ambition. A serious Grass Type with the wisdom of the forest. A fun loving Water Type with a go-with-the-flow attitude." _

_I was speechless. I had just lost everything, and now I was being asked to save the world? However, the thought of teaching this Clone a lesson, or seventy-eight, felt pretty good, admittedly. _

"_I understand you have just suffered a great loss. Believe me, I know. But, rest assured this journey will heal the scars upon your heart."_

_What choice did I have but to accept? I spent the rest of the day preparing by putting anything that made it into the bag my parents gave me._

_The following morning, I set out. Mew appeared in front of me, and she said to me, "The first step will be to find the Ravaged Ruins. There will be an item there that will allow you to locate Clone. Once you have done that, you must climb to the top of Cryptic Tower, Clone's base. Once there, you must defeat him. And remember… show no mercy…"_

_I nodded in confirmation and set off. For the next nine years, I've been traveling around the region, trying to find the Ravaged Ruins, but no luck… everywhere I went, Clone had struck. Destroyed homes, injured Pokémon, torn families… until I came upon the Valley of Peace. For so long, the valley had remained safe from Clone. I was relieved to see this, but at the same time, exhausted from my travels. But I pushed on, kept going. But one night, I had reached my limit; no rest, no treatment, no decent meals in so long, and on top of that, there was a terrible storm. _

_I didn't know what I was going to do. I thought it was going to be the end of me… when someone called out to me in the storm. You guys, Char, Venus, and Hydro._

(End of Flashback)

"Whoa… that's such a sad story…"

I decided to try and lighten the mood.

"Well, on a positive note, you guys have kind of… well… made it better for me."

"Yeah… Anyway, what do we gotta do to find these Ravaged Ruins?"

"Wait… what?!"

"Yeah! We gotta find it, right?"

"Let's get this show on the road!"

"WAIT A MINUTE!"

They all turned to me, surprised.

"Who said you were coming along? Were you not listening? Did you hear just how dangerous this is?! … No. It will be safer if you all just stay here and lay low and leave the dangerous things to me."

"Hey, we're all in that prophecy, right?"

"…That would be my guess…"

"Then we're all in this together, like it or not. Besides, we'd never let a friend of ours throw himself into danger alone."

I have to admit, he had me there. Secretly, I was glad that they were going to be coming for some reason.

"But, I honestly don't know where to start…"

"Hmm… Oh! I know! There's an ancient cave a few miles from Rigged Peak, Amber Cave, and in the depths lives an Aerodactyl! He might be able to tell us something!"

"Then tomorrow, we'll go to Amber Cave!"

"YEAH!"

End of Chapter

Buizel: And that ends chapter 6. Exciting! So, we're going to do this little comment thing because BraviaryGirl7 is… uh… sleeping? Hey, since when does she take naps?

Courage: Since she has rough nights.

Me: *wakes up* Shadows! Huh? …Sorry, dreaming.

Chokka: … I think the lesson here is, never watch so much Doctor Who in one day.

Me: Ugh, too right… Anyway, please Read and Review. BraviaryGirl7 out. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going back to sleep.


	7. Chapter 7: Amber, Aerodactyl and Answers

Me: Well… that last chapter really looked better in my head. Anyway, sorry I've been so lazy and slow, but between school and worrying about catching my dad's cold, I've had a lot on my plate.

Satoshi: …Yeah. In other words, you're just being lazy.

Me: Hey! Am not! For your information, I've been working on ideas for the sequels of this story! As well as other kinds of Pokémon fan fictions!

Buizel: Yeah! And they're gonna be great!

Me: Thank you, Buizel.

Pichu: So stop talking and get walking!

Me: That doesn't even make any sense! And hey, how did you even get in here? The fanfic you appear in hasn't even been published yet!

Pichu: Yeah, so?

Me: Out!

Pichu: Okay, okay. No need to get huffy. *flies out of the room*

Me: *sigh* Anyway, I don't own Pokémon. Let's just get the chapter started.

*nothing happens*

Me: Hey, guy in the booth! Now.

Chapter 7

(The next morning, Satoshi's POV)

Today was the day. Today I might finally get some answers, and my mission would be that much closer to being complete… While at the same time, I had to worry about my new traveling companions. Why did I ever agree to let them come? Char almost _died_ yesterday! Why did I ever mention that prophecy? It's my fault they're in danger… in more ways than one… I decided to just focus on getting ready to go to Amber Cave. For the moment, anyway.

(Tranquil Town, Char's POV)

"Okay, according to this Wonder Map of the region, there are a lot of Rock and Ground Types at Amber Cave. So, between the four of us, we should be able to handle it. Let's see… uh, there are 15 floors, and a slight chance of traps, and zero percent chance of there being any Monster Houses! Hmm? But according to the info on this map, 'Very few have ever made it to the end. And those who have, were not able to awaken the Aerodactyl and find the knowledge they sought.' Weird… Ah, well. We'll cross that bridge when we come to it I guess."

I put the map away and noticed that my friends had already left to whereabouts unknown—except Satoshi who had actually stayed to hear the whole thing. I couldn't help but stare at the gash on his stomach from the Ekans bite yesterday. It really didn't look good at all.

"Hey, is your stomach alright?"

"Hmm? Oh, yeah, but I doubt that mark is going to go away anytime soon. Ugh."

I reached into the bag and pulled out a Pecha Berry. I gave it to him which he gratefully accepted. Hopefully that would help. I remembered that Venus and Hydro had run off to who knows where.

"I wonder if those guys heard a word I said." I started to go after them, but was interrupted.

"Hey Char." I turned around to face him.

"Yeah?"

"Can I ask you something?"

"Shoot."

"…Why are you guys doing all this? I mean, you've only known me for a few weeks, and you're doing all this to help me. Why?"

This surprised me.

"What, you really need to ask? That's what friends are for. Now come on, let's find Venus and Hydro."

"Yeah… But… that wasn't really an answer…"

(Venus' POV)

"Don't you think we should have stuck around and listened to Char? This mission _is_ pretty important, you know."

"Whatever, if it's something important, they'll tell us again before we leave, right? Besides, why not get a head start in preparing?"

I slapped my forehead with my vine. "Ugh! How can we possibly know _how_ to prepare if we don't know _what_ to prepare for?!"

"Easy; it's a cave, rocks, dirt and that sort of stuff. We know how to prepare for that kind of dungeon. So, we just add that to how we normally prepare and we'll be okay."

I opened my mouth, but no words came out. In a really, really weird way, that sort of made sense. Kind of. I just shook my head and kept walking.

(Back at the crossroads, about half an hour later, Char's POV)

We were both surprised when we found that Venus and Hydro had prepared so well; it was as if they had heard all the things I said! Oh, well. We confirmed that we were prepared, and we set out.

(Amber Cave, Satoshi's POV)

The cave was pretty appropriately named; even the walls and floor seemed to be made of amber! It was very beautiful; although very slippery. We soon got used to it, and made our way through the cave.

The first floor, we found the stairs fairly quickly and went on to the second floor after dealing with an Omanyte

The second floor, we landed in the room with the stairs and several Poké coins. We picked them up, which added up to about 263 Poké, and moved on.

It took a little searching to find the stairs this time, and we ran into a Kabuto, but I knocked it out with a Thunder Shock. We found 378 Poké before moving on.

The next several floors, we found Poké and enemies and wandered around quite a bit before actually finding the room with the stairs. We had picked up 847 Poké before moving on.

(Time Skip, b10f)

"Hmm? This is a strange floor… it's all one room… ? What's that?" I gestured to a strange item in the middle of the room. It was shaped like a rain drop, but was colored like it was amber. I was somehow drawn to it.

I picked it up and examined it closer. Upon closer inspection, I realized what it was.

"It's an Amber Tear. An item that can tame enemy Pokémon and is well sought by many explorers. But… if any Pokémon made it this far… they would have very well picked it up."

"Hey, check this out!" The others were looking at writing on the wall. I walked up closer, and saw the message was written in ancient footprint runes.

"Here, I'll see what it says. I learned to read ancient runes while I was traveling around. Hmm…. 'The treasure of Amber Cave must be returned. Its true owner lies in wait, undisturbed. If you let your greed take control, you will be trapped forever with your corrupted soul.' And that's the end of the message…" I couldn't make sense of it. I looked to the others and they just shrugged. We decided to forget about it for now and get to the end.

(Time Skip, b15f)

We had finally arrived at the depths of the cave and began to search for the Aerodactyl.

"Yoo-hoo, Aerodactyl! Are you home?"

"Hydro, I really don't think that's going to work."

We went a bit deeper. We kept our eyes open the whole way, but there was no sign of it. We were beginning to think about going back home… until we heard what sounded like a small roar!

A Kabutops and two Omastar jumped down from the ceiling and proceeded to attack us! We jumped back just in time, but the Kabutops lightly grazed my scar with its claw. I winced, but tried to hide it by going into battle position.

We all knew we would have to fight, so we were ready. I used Thunder Bolt on the one of the Omastar, paralyzing it. I realized I would have to watch Char's back in this fight… mostly to make up for chickening out at Poison Valley…

Venus and Hydro were dealing with the other Omastar, quite well to be honest. But then, who was fighting the Kabutops? …..Oh no…

"TAKE THAT! METAL CLAW!" The Kabutops blocked it, pushed Char back against a wall, pinned him down and prepared to strike! I knocked out the Omastar in front of me with another Thunder Bolt and rushed to help Char!

(Char's POV)

The Kabutops had me pinned against the wall, and with its free claw, prepared to use Slash! I struggled to break free, but after five seconds, I saw that it was useless and gave up. I closed my eyes and waited for it, knowing well that a Kabutops' Slash can slice you in half!

I waited… and nothing happened. The next thing I knew, I was back on the ground, free from any claws. I looked up and saw Satoshi sparking. He must have taken the Kabutops out… with a Volt Tackle! I thanked him and we looked over to the others who had knocked out the last Omastar. We all took a breather; the battle was exhausting.

"So… now what?"

As if by answer, the ground started shaking, and at the back of the 'room', something began to rise out of the ground.

We all walked over to it, and after inspection, it appeared to be… a stone Aerodactyl… It had its eyes closed and its wings folded up like it was sleeping.

"Is this the Aerodactyl we were looking for?" I asked no one in particular. Hydro shrugged.

"The treasure must be returned… its owner waits undisturbed… Of course, that's it! We have to give the Amber Tear back to Aerodactyl! See, there's a small indent on its chest!" It was true. On Aerodactyl's chest was a small indent in the shape of a rain drop.

"It makes perfect sense! Anyone who made it this far DID pick up the Amber Tear, but lost it because they didn't return it to its real owner! This cave and Aerodactyl are connected, so the cave can sense whether or not the treasure has been returned! And anyone who got greedy and tried to keep it would be trapped forever! So, all we have to do is place the Tear in the indent!" Satoshi walked forward and carefully placed it in the Aerodactyl's chest. I was amazed; he had figured all this out all on his own? For a few minutes, nothing happened. But, suddenly, the ground started shaking again, and the Aerodactyl unfolded its wings and let out a groan! It happened so fast, it startled all of us!

(Satoshi's POV)

This was it. Maybe now I could finally get some answers! I admit, I was a little scared, but also excited at the same time! The Aerodactyl stretched out its wings and yawned. I guess I would be at least a little stiff if I had been asleep for a few thousand years too. I waited for another reaction. I decided to try and get some conversation out of it.

"Um… Hello?"

"…Greetings, young ones."

Several millennia of sleep had really done a number on his voice. It was old and very course. But, I was glad we would be able to communicate. Aerodactyl looked around the cave, then down at his chest. He gently put a claw on the Amber Tear.

"Hmm…Seems someone has finally returned the treasure… Tell me, young ones. How long have I been asleep?"

"Uh, I'd say a couple thousand years. Oh, I'm Satoshi, this is Char, Venus and Hydro."

"Is that so? Oh, nice to meet ya. So long… and yet, the cave has not changed one bit. It seems everything has gone according to plan…"

"What do you mean?"

"See, when I was young, I was always told that I had an excellent memory. I traveled around my region, and saw many fantastic things. I wanted to share my experiences with as many Pokémon as possible. Luckily, I was also told that I was a good story teller. As I grew to adulthood, I traveled everywhere I could, searching for new wonders to share. After about ten years, I realized I wouldn't be around forever. However, what I wanted more than anything was to be able to tell my tales to many future generations. Quite luckily, a Pokémon by the name of Mew appeared to me and told me exactly what to do to allow the future generations to hear of my stories. She told me to carve a cave in which I would rest until one with generosity in their heart would awaken me. She told me to wait in the depths of the cave. And, you see, the Amber Tear and I are connected. So, if it is ever removed from its place in my chest, I will go into a deep sleep. Furthermore, Mew granted me the power to see the world changing while I was sleeping."

Figures. Mew set everything up so it would all go according to plan.

"So I take it you also put those markings five floors back?"

"That is correct. Now, I know you have come seeking knowledge, and perhaps I may be of assistance?"

"Yes. We need to find the Ravaged Ruins."

"Ah, yes. That ancient city. Well, in order to get there, you need to know the way, obviously. And the only known map is hidden in the ruins of a castle, Black Wood Castle. Where it is hidden, I do not know… but if you figured out how to wake me up, you should be able to figure it out."

"Alright, thank you."

We turned around and began to leave, but we were stopped when Aerodactyl suddenly flew in front of us.

"Wait. Is it… perhaps alright… if I come with you? I want to see how the world has changed since I fell asleep. And… I want to tell of what I have seen."

We looked at each other, and all nodded. I mean, why not?

"I guess, but do you have a place to stay?"

"…"

I took that as a no. I asked to talk to my teammates in private.

"Take all the time you need."

We needed to discuss what we were going to do, when I came up with something.

"What if… he joined our team?"

This surprised the others at first, but then we all agreed it was a good idea. We walked up to Aerodactyl, telling him our idea. He seemed a bit surprised.

"You sure you want an old Pokémon like me on your team?"

"Well, sure, why not? Besides, I bet everyone back in town would love to hear about your tales." He considered it for a minute.

"… Alright, if you're sure I won't slow you down."

"Of course we're sure. I'm certain your vast knowledge will prove to be very useful." I said with a smile.

"Oh, stop. But, thank you. I'll definitely do my best and try not to get in the way."

"Of course. Glad to have you on board, Aerodactyl."

"You can call me Raptor."

"Alright, Raptor, let's get going back to the base and get some rest. We've got a long day tomorrow."

"Well, when we get back, we're going to have to officially register Raptor as a member of the KantoPals. We also need to get him a badge and scarf."

"We'll just have to talk to Pidgeotto about that."

(Back at the Base)

"Wow! I never thought I'd see an Aerodactyl! Ahem. So, you want to register him as a team member?"

"That's right."

"Alright then. Just hold on a second."

Pidgeotto reached in his bag and pulled out another badge and handed it to Raptor.

"Um… what am I supposed to do with this?"

"Oh! Hold on another second!"

He reached in his bag again and pulled out a Defense Scarf. Raptor tied it around his neck and fastened the badge to the scarf. Then, a voice started emanating from the badge.

_Name: Raptor_

_Species: Aerodactyl_

_Age: 3,050_

_Attributes: Incredible Memory_

_Welcome to Team KantoPals, Raptor the Aerodactyl_

"Congratulations! You are now an official member of the KantoPals!"

"Amazing! I've never seen technology like this!"

"Well, now that that's over with, how about we have some dinner and get some rest?"

We all nodded. We went into the base, and all helped with dinner. Char had Raptor help with cooking. He was better at it than I expected him to be, making me think he had done this before. After dinner, we all helped set up another bed, which had to be quite a bit bigger than the others. Once everything was done, we all went to sleep.

End of Chapter

Me: And so that ends Chapter 7. How'd you guys like it?

Buizel: It was cool! The KantoPals got a new member!

Pika: Yeah, and they're getting closer to finding the Ravaged Ruins!

Kala: And Raptor's story was cool!

Aerodactyl: I'm glad Raptor's getting a bigger part in the story than you first planned him to be.

Courage: Very good.

Me: Thanks guys! And, it's true I was originally going to give Raptor a very small part, but I kind of like this better.

Riolu: So, how come we're not allowed in here again?

Pichu: Yeah!

Me: *slaps forehead* I told you, because your fanfic hasn't been published yet, so I'm going to have to ask you to leave.

Pichu: (Watch this.) Oh, uh, we were just leaving. But, uh, could you do us a favor and hold this? *put headphones on my head*

Me: What?

Both: *yell into the microphone* TESTING!

Me: Ow! Ow, ow, ow!

Buizel: Are you all right?

Me: What?!

Buizel: I said are you all right?!

Me: I can't hear you over all this ringing!

Buizel: Uh, ladies and gentlemen, due to, uh, technical difficulties, we're going to have to cut this short.

Me: Yeah! And once I get my hearing back, I'm going to make myself a pair of Pokémon coats!

Both: *run out of the room*

Me: ….. I can't believe they fell for that.

Buizel: So, you okay now?

Me: Yep. Please Read and Review. BraviarGirl7 out!


	8. Chapter 8: Specters?

Me: Alright, I'll keep this short. Satoshi and company are going to go to Black Wood Castle in this chapter and I have nothing else to say. Except I don't own Pokémon. So, to the Chapter!

Chapter 8

(Satoshi's POV)

I woke up along with the others, and for a moment, I had forgotten that Raptor had joined our team. I was a bit surprised at the sight of five Pokémon in the room for a moment, until I remembered yesterday's events. I was exhausted from yesterday, but I was determined to find the Ravaged Ruins. We had breakfast, and headed into town to prepare.

(Crossroads, Raptor's POV)

"So, Raptor, what do you know about Black Wood Castle?" this was a question that made me think.

"Well, that's quite an interesting tale. Eh, however, it is quite a long tale."

"That's alright; we need to get as much info as we can."

"Very well. Now, Black Wood Castle is the center of the ruins of an ancient kingdom; The Nation of the Umbra. If my memory serves, I believe there was a song written about it. Ahem.

_Legend tells of a kingdom, _

_Far off to the West,_

_Filled with many Pokémon, _

_At fighting they were best._

_The residents all Dark-Types,_

_A civilized formed pack,_

_Each experienced fighters,_

_All from the Woods of Black._

_The legend of the Umbra,_

_A kingdom lost in time,_

_The origin of Dark-Types,_

_And the place of their prime._

_The kingdom reigned peacefully,_

_Until one fateful day,_

_Disaster struck and then,_

_The kingdom faded away._

_The disaster to this day,_

_Remains a mystery_

_No one today would know_

_What it would be._

_The legend of the Umbra,_

_A nation long forgotten,_

_Where the Dark-Types first came from_

_And their tales long begotten. _

_The legend is alive today,_

_For one reason only,_

_The descendants of the Woods of Black_

_Are still alive, you see._

And that pretty much sums up what I know about it."

"Alright… so what exactly are the 'Woods of Black'?"

"A fabled wood said to be near the remains of the kingdom. It's said that all the Dark-Types came from this forest. Unfortunately, the woods were also supposedly destroyed along with the kingdom. But, it _is_ where the castlegot its name. Or, that's how the legend goes, at least."

I looked up, and saw a huge crowd of rather young Pokémon other than my team gathered around me, each and every one of them looking amazed by my story.

"Heh, heh, seems like you've got some new fans, Raptor. And, perhaps they would like to hear another one?" I have to admit, Satoshi was pretty sly when he wanted to be.

"Yeah, yeah, yeah! Another story!" The kids all sat down around me, never taking their eyes off me. I smiled, it was really very cute. But, I knew I would have to help my team prepare. As if reading my mind, Satoshi answered,

"We'll handle preparing, while you tell these kids another one of your tales." I nodded and thought for a second about which story to tell them.

"Alright, who wants to hear… the Ninetales Legend?" The kids all cheered.

"Alright, settle down, and I'll tell you. Ahem, it all began a long, long time ago… in a world not too different from ours… there lived a Pokémon by the name of Ninetales… Now, anyone foolish enough to touch one of the Ninetales' tails would be afflicted with a thousand-year curse… Of course, there was someone stupid enough to grab a tail…a human."

(Satoshi's POV)

I was glad Raptor had a chance to tell his stories to those kids, and we had a chance to prepare. After we prepared, I withdrew 500 Poké from the bank.

"What's that for?"

"You'll see."

We went back to the crossroads and saw that Raptor was just about done.

"And that human lives to this day. Well, that's the Ninetales Legend." The kids seemed to love it. I waved to Raptor, getting his attention. "That's all for today, little ones." The kids all awwwed as they began to walk back home. "Don't worry; I'll have another one ready tomorrow." The groaning immediately turned to cheering. I saw Pidgey hopping along with them, and stopped him.

"Hey, Pidgey!"

"Yeah?"

"Can you give this to your brother for us?" I handed him the 500 Poké. "Tell him it's for Raptor's scarf."

"Oh, he told me to give you this note." He gave me a note and I read it out loud.

_There's no need to pay me back for the scarf; consider it a tip of the beak for saving my little brother._

_-Pidgeotto_

"… Wow… tell your brother thanks for us, okay?"

"Sure thing, if you tell Raptor thanks for the story." I nodded, and he flapped off.

"Heh, the kids say thanks for the story."

"It was my pleasure. Now, we all set to go?" I looked at my other teammates, and back at Raptor.

"Um, we've thought it over, and we've decided that you should probably stay behind and get to know your way around."

"Oh, I see…"

"It's got nothing to do with you personally. We just think you ought to get familiar with the area. And, possibly the dungeons surrounding the area."

"I understand. Good luck finding that map!" And he walked off to begin memorizing.

"Thanks! Well, let's go."

(Umbra Nation Ruins)

"Alright, for now let's focus on getting to the castle. And no getting distracted by anything on the way."

"Right! Let's get going and find that map!"

We kept walking towards the center of the fallen kingdom, keeping an eye out for anything suspicious. There was something… vaguely familiar about this place… as if I had seen it somewhere before….. I kept trying to remember where I had seen it before… until I noticed we were about a mile from the castle already.

(Black Wood Castle Ruins, Char's POV)

….. Needless to say, whatever disaster struck in the past did a pretty good job…. The place was totally demolished.

"Alright, spread out and see if you can find anything. And remember, search for anything suspicious."

"Aye, aye!"

"Yes, sir!"

"Will do!"

We all responded at the same time and walked off in different directions.

…

…. About an hour later, and we didn't find anything…

"Any luck?"

"No… Sorry….." Satoshi looked down for a second, as if in deep thought. He looked up again and thought for a minute.

"Well….. We've searched everywhere _around_ the castle… so the map's got to be _inside _the castle."

"Uh…. Okay…. And how are we going to get inside exactly? The tower's half-buried, and the only window is, like, twenty feet above us." He thought for a minute…. Well, actually, five.

"Alright, I've got it. Here's what we do…."

The plan was actually pretty clever. What we did was take some stones from what was left of the kingdom, stacked them against the tower like a staircase, and proceeded to climb up to the tower. Unfortunately, we couldn't find enough stones to get us all the way to the top.

"Hmm… Alright, new plan. Form a ladder." Which was also a pretty good idea. Hydro climbed on top of Venus, I climbed onto Hydro's shell, and Satoshi climbed on my shoulders and barely reached the window. He grabbed the windowsill with both paws, and amazingly pulled us all into the tower. But, he apparently didn't take into account how far the floor would be from the window… So, we ended up falling about thirty feet… Everything blacked out for a while after that…

…

"Ugh… What happened…? Everybody alright?" I felt a little dazed and dizzy, but managed to get up on wobbly legs.

"Urgh… Hey, glad to see everyone's alright, but would you guys mind getting off me?"

(Satoshi's POV)

I have to say, it's pretty hard to breathe with roughly 53 pounds of Pokémon on your back. They all jumped off me, apologizing for landing on me. You know what, I chalk that up to poor planning…. Just like I didn't think about how we were going to keep from getting lost… And I just might have forgotten to mention that…. Mainly because I kept thinking, _where the heck have I seen this place before?_ I kept trying to think of it, but was snapped out of my thoughts.

"Hey! Quit daydreaming and let's get looking for that map!"

"R-right, sorry."

We went through the dimly lit halls of the ancient castle, our only light from Char's tail. We searched every inch of the halls as we continued down the corridor. _Where have I seen this before? _kept repeating in my mind. I was seriously starting to freak out; I knew exactly where to go, it was like something was guiding me….

By the time we were about 1/8 of the way down, we came to an intersection. There were two paths going in different directions, and between the two paths was a wall. Near the ceiling was a lit torch. I wondered how the torch could possibly still be lit when….

_Don't let your eyes deceive you. Only one path is safe. Choose wrong, and it will mean your end. Let the light guide you. _

"Gah! Did…. Did you guys hear that?!"

"Uh…. Hear what? If you're starting to hear things, we better find that map and get out of here, soon."

"Ha, ha, very funny."

I thought for a minute about these weird thoughts that weren't mine… when I decided I could trust them…. I walked forward to inspect the wall under the torch, but when I reached out to touch it, my hand went right through it!

"What the…" I tried it again with the same result. I had figured it out; the wall was just an illusion. I went through it to find what seemed to be a very long spiral staircase.

"What's in there?" I heard from the other side of the wall.

"Stairs…. Lots of stairs….." I sighed as the others came in and looked down on the seemingly endless staircase. We just decided to start going without complaining.

After what seemed to be hours of walking, we came to the main room in the castle. I started to think about splitting up again, but I remembered what those voices said. _Let the light guide you. _I noticed a trail of lit torches leading down a path on the other side of the large room. I lead my team to the hall and we proceeded to follow the torches.

"Are you sure you know what you're doing?" I shrugged. We all walked through the hall, and I saw many ancient things; tapestries, old swords, suits of armor, you name it. After walking for about half an hour, we came to what seemed to be a dungeon. (This time I mean a _dungeon _dungeon, not a Mystery Dungeon.) It was fascinating and horrifying at the same time. Mainly because there were fragments of bones scattered all over the place. We looked around for anything suspicious, when I found something that seemed a bit more than a little disturbing. Near the exit was scattered shreds of cloth; seemingly the same material used to make bags. I searched around a bit more and found a trail of fragments of broken items. Letting my curiosity get the best of me, I followed the trail out of the dungeon and down a hall which was, again, lit by flickering torches. Some of the items were starting to look kind of….. familiar…. I kept walking along the fragment- littered hall until we came to a smaller room than the others we had been through so far. Unlike the others, this one had no other entrances. This one was a dead end.

We looked around the room in shock; all around the room were broken weapons, bones, teeth, as well as the item fragments that lead me to this room. It seemed to be a place where a titanic battle ensued.

I looked to the back of the room where the trail ended, and at the end was a bag not unlike mine. Behind the bag were two piles of bones. I walked toward them. Suddenly, the bones started glowing! A mysterious mist came out of them and began to take form.

"Aaaahhhh! Ghosts!" Char screamed as he and the others ran and hid behind a column. But I stood still as I watched the glow took form into… two Raichu. They were translucent, and I noticed that there was a male and a female. Then suddenly, it hit me.

"….. Mom? Dad?"

End of Chapter

Me: Ooh, CLIFFHANGER! Okay, first thing, PLEASE someone Review. I haven't gotten a single new Review in weeks. I don't care if it's criticism, or if someone complains about the cliffhanger, but someone please Review. Okay, next, I know the bones thing is a bit…. gory, but I assure you, it's a one-time thing. So please look forward to the next chapter, I'll get started one that as soon as I can and—

Riolu: Ahem.

Me: Oh for the love of… What now?

Riolu: It seems that some idiot *glances at Yuma* left the TV on when the Penguins was on.

Me: Yeah, so?

Riolu: So, it was on that Winky Factory episode, and now Rico's gone 'marshmaloco'…. in your room….

Me: WHAT?!

Rico: *far away* MEOW-MEOWS!

Me: Oh for crying out loud! I have to deal with an emergency right now so I'm out of here! BraviaryGirl7 out!


	9. Chapter 9: Departure

Me: *Chases Rico around room* RICO GET BACK HERE!

Rico: MEOW-MEOWS!

Me: NO! THERE WILL BE NO MORE MARSHMALLOW KITTENS! DO I MAKE MYSELF CLEAR?!

Yuma: She's sure been chasing him awhile.

Ash: Yeah, no thanks to you.

Yuma: What?! You were watching too!

Ash: Well, I'm not the one who left the TV on!

Yuma: Well, _I'm_ not the one who suggested we come here in the first place!

Ash: Well, _I'm_ not the one who said 'what could go wrong'!

Ash and Yuma: *glare at each other*

Riolu: Aye yi yi. *uses Psychic to knock them out*

Ash and Yuma: Owww….

Me: Ugh! Why didn't I think of that?! Chokka, use Psychic and get this maniac back where he belongs!

Chokka: About time you asked. *uses Psychic on Rico*

Rico: *in the TV* MEOW-MEOWS! MEOW-MEOWS!

Me: *turns TV off* Ugh, finally. So, here we'll be seeing what happened after the cliffhanger. Oh, and as for the song in the previous chapter, the words are sung to the tune of The Black Knight in Phineas and Ferb. I'm a fan, alright? Sorry about kind of going overboard with the medieval stuff. I just really got into the chapter. I can honestly claim the lyrics in that song, but credit for the lyrics for the song in this chapter goes to TheBlackEevee100 on YouTube. And that's only half the song! Oh, and don't worry about the two guys unconscious on the floor over there; they'll be awake by the end of the chapter. And, it almost makes up for the fact that it's their fault my room is going to have to be redone _completely_.

Everyone: *looks at me funny*

Me: What? It's always funny when they get knocked out.

Kala: If you say so…. Well, can I say the disclaimer then?

Me: Go for it.

Kala: Yes! Our master doesn't own Pokémon; except us! How was that?

Me: Great! So, without further ado, Chapter 9!

Chapter 9

(Satoshi's POV)

"….. Mom? Dad?" The two Raichu smiled warmly at me. The female spoke to me.

"Yes, darling, it's us. Glad to see you finally found this place." I couldn't believe it.

"What… what happened to you guys? How… how are you—"

"Ghosts?" My dad finished for me. I nodded in response.

"We'll tell you the whole story. _All_ of you." My mom sighed. I turned and noticed my friends were still cowering behind the column, and walked over to them.

"Guys, come out of there. I want you to meet someone." They slowly came out.

"Y-you sure it's safe?" I nodded. They reluctantly followed me to the Raichu specters.

"Guys, this is my dad, Thunder, and my mom, Shock." (Get it? Thunder Shock?)

"Uh… alright. Nice to meet you Mr. and Mrs. …." Char started, but I realized I had never told them my last name.

"Tajiri." My dad finished.

"Oh, uh… Well, I'm Char Hitokage, the Bulbasaur is Venus Fushigidane, and the Squirtle is Hydro Zenigame. We're Satoshi's friends and teammates." Huh, so those are their last names. I guess I was just surprised because I had never asked before.

"Yes, it's very nice to meet you all. I trust Satoshi hasn't been much trouble, has he?" My mom said, teasing me the way any parent teases their child. My friends snickered and my face turned red.

"Mom! I'm not a baby anymore!" This just made them laugh even more. I groaned and they stopped laughing. "Anyway, back on track. What happened to you guys?" I needed to know. I just had to.

"Alright… since you really want to know…"

(Flashback, 3rd person POV)

_It was midnight, pitch black because the sky was completely covered in clouds. Two Raichu could be seen in the ruins of the ancient kingdom. But, although they were in a museum filled with fascinating artifacts, they didn't stop once to admire the scenery. Why? Because they were running as fast as their little paws could carry them. (Okay, maybe their paws are not SO little, but you get the idea.) They couldn't afford to stop or slow down for even a split-second, or it would mean their end. They had been separated from the rest of their team; because what was after them had already gotten to the rest of their team… They didn't even have time to mourn… They ran through the carnage, only one thing on their minds: "Have to get away!" What were they running from? A coal-black dragon like creature twice as big as a Raichu with curved spines on the back of its sleek body, glistening razor blade-sharp fangs and claws, its arrow shaped tail darting around as it bounded after the two Raichu on all fours. The two were protecting something of the utmost importance; something in their bag. Their pursuer was after two things; the thing in their bag, and their lives. The male Raichu led his mate to the castle tower, climbed up to the window using their tails to support them, jumped through, and landed gracefully on their feet. Their pursuer jumped after them, landing effortlessly and resumed its chase instantly. The pair ran through the corridors, but their chaser caught up for a second and slashed out at its prey! Luckily, it only hit their bag, which leaked some of the items in it out on the floor as they ran, which were then crushed under the claws of their pursuer and broken into little fragments. After what seemed like hours of the nearly unbearable soul-rending terror, the two were finally cornered… The creature bared its teeth and snarled as it showed them it had no qualms about what it was about to do and glared at them with its beady, black eyes. It held them down with a shadowy substance, which kept them from escaping. The two held each other and shook as the creature opened its mouth and formed a sort of black flame, with which it would complete its mission. The Raichu mates looked into each other's eyes; they both knew it was their end. They knew there was nothing they could do to escape their fate. The female asked her mate the question they were both afraid to answer: "What can we do?" Her mate looked down, and looked back at her._

"_The only thing we _can _do, accept our fate, and hope our son will find his way here someday." His mate placed her head on his chest and cried for a few seconds. She looked back up at him, and looked him in the eye._

"_I love you." She said, wanting them to be her last words._

"_I love you too." He replied, wanting her to know he would always love her. The creature was nearly finished charging up its attack. The mates closed their eyes as they leaned forward, tails intertwined, and shared one last kiss. Ten seconds passed, and the creature was finished charging up the attack. The kiss ended, and the two mates hugged each other. The creature let loose its attack._

(End of Flashback, Char's POV)

I felt so bad for Satoshi, and his parents. He looked crestfallen and distraught. (Look it up if you don't know what it means.) I wanted to help, but sometimes Pokémon just need to be left alone. Curious, I asked one of my questions that everyone says are never ending.

"What was the thing you two were protecting?" The two looked at each other, and whispered barely audibly, but I caught it anyway.

"_Should we show them?"_

"_Satoshi trusts them, so why not?" _They both nodded, and reached into the torn bag. They held up a small marble-like yellow sphere about the size of my fist. I was wondering what it was, when once again, Satoshi answered for me.

"Is that… a Light Ball?" Once again, I was stumped. I shook my head in confusion, hoping for a clearer answer, which I soon got. "Oh, a Light Ball is a special item specific for Pikachu. A very precious item, too."

"Also a family heirloom. Been in the family for 70 years. Hopefully, it will help you on your journey." His mom said as she handed it to him. He held it carefully, marveled at the rare item he now possessed. He put it in the bag, and looked back at us, with a look that said: A moment, please. I nodded and led the others out of the room. I understood he wanted some time alone with his parents; because I had read enough spiritual fantasy stories to know what was going to happen soon enough…

(Satoshi's POV)

"Well, I think I can speak for both of us when I say that we're both glad to see that you've made such good friends."

"Yes, I truly am blessed to have met them."

"And they're lucky to have a good leader like you. Why, I'd even say you can become as great a team as our own Team Protector some day!" My dad always took great pride in his team. I chuckled and looked at the precious heirloom again. My smile soon disappeared, as I had a million unanswered questions.

"… Were you guys the ones guiding me through this place?" They nodded.

"We had to make sure that you would come to this room. Sorry if we freaked you out."

"That's alright. So… I have something to tell you… I…I… I failed… I… I couldn't protect the others back in Emerald Forest…" I started tearing up. "I… was…. Unable to fulfil my promise…" They looked confused.

"What do you mean?"

"I couldn't protect Serena or the little ones from the same kind of thing that… well… ended you…" Now they looked more confused than ever. For a while, they were silent, as if in deep thought. They looked at each other, and then back at me.

"No, you didn't fail. Believe me; we would have known if what you think happened had actually happened." (Yes, I know that doesn't make all that much sense, but just try to roll with it. Parents often say kooky stuff like that.) I tilted my head in confusion.

"What we're saying is, we would have known if the creature had gotten to them too. It's a weird spiritual connection thing; we don't quite understand it either." Now _I _was the one more confused than ever. Did this mean they were… alive? I just couldn't believe it. But, boy did I want to. I dropped it for the time being and went to get my friends and let them know it was okay to come back in.

"You know, with all that's happened, I nearly forgot the reason we came here in the first place; to find the map to the Ravaged Ruins."

"Oh, of course. The map is very close by. In fact, look at your feet." I did so, and saw that I was standing on cracks in the floor. I stepped off, and tried to dig into the cracks. But, digging through stone is a lot harder than it looks. Ouch… So, after shaking the pain off, I used a move called Thunder Punch on the ground. The tile shattered and revealed a torn and faded, but still readable, map. I carefully picked it up and examined it. On the bottom left corner was just a hole, and from it led a line drawn in ink to a very large looking city. I reached in the bag and held out our wonder map. I lined up the maps and marked the spot where the city was on our map. This was it. I had finally found out where the Ravaged Ruins was. I put the maps away and faced my parents.

"Mom, dad, thank you." I said sincerely.

"It is no problem, seeing as it was our duty to give it to you." What?

"So… if you guys are spirits… why are you still here? Shouldn't spirits go to the spirit world?"

"Some spirits can't until they've dealt with 'unfinished business'. And since we have… well… it's time for us to go…" Their 'bodies' started becoming even more see-through. I understood, but I… I couldn't take it anymore! I dropped the bag and ran up to them, hugging them and finally letting out the sadness I had kept bottled up until now.

"Shhh, it's going to be alright. Do you remember that lullaby we would sing to you every night?

(Sung to 'In the Morning Sun' in PMD 2, Explorers of Sky.)

_I'll stand here with you_

'_Til the end._

_I'll stand here with you_

'_Til the end._

_I'll stand til the end_

_Someday I'll be gone_

_I will be…_

_I will be…_

_Gone…_

_Believe in you_

_My true friend_

_For now and here and soon I will be gone._

_Believe in us_

_My dear friend_

_We'll meet in our dreams to not forget_

_That we were adventurers_

_Sticking together_

_Here and there_

_Everywhere_

_Through the time til now_

_We will be one heart, one soul_

_Just one goal_

_To never forget!_

_We'll go…_

_Through eclipse and light!_

_I'll stand here with you til the end!_

_I'm standing in,_

_I'm standing in,_

_I'm in the Morning Sun!_

_I'll stand_

_Here with you_

_Til the end_

_Of my life!_

_I'm standing in,_

_I'm in the Morning Sun!_

_In the Morning Sun!_

Be brave, darling. We love you."

"Love you too." I said teary-eyed. They then completely disappeared.

"Thank you…" I stood silently for a moment.

"Hey… you okay?"

"Yeah… I'll be fine."

(Char's POV)

I knew Satoshi was strong, I knew he would be alright with a little time, but something told me that a little time was all we had. But for what? I thought about it for a second, when suddenly…

"Can I assume that you are prepared to leave?" The voice seemed to come out of nowhere, as if it was everywhere at once. All of us, except Satoshi, looked around to try and find the voice. Suddenly, a flash of light appeared and a figure materialized in the middle of the room. The figure was a small, cat-shaped body with white skin, an extremely long tail, and light-blue, triangle-shaped eyes floating in the air. Reading my mind once again, Satoshi answered my question before I even thought it.

"Hello, Mew." Mew?! The Legendary Pokémon who sent him on this journey?!

"You seem to be doing well. And, although it has taken you nine years, it seems you have finally found the way to the Ravaged Ruins. Good job."

"I'll take that as a compliment. Guys, this is Mew. She, as you know, sent me on this journey." We nodded. I took this opportunity to try and examine a Legendary. From what I had heard about Mew, they were supposed to be bouncy and playful and fun-loving! When I looked at this Mew… I saw none of those things… This Mew was exactly the opposite. Serious, solemn, and sober. (I looked up synonyms for serious.) The point is, this Mew was nothing like in the stories.

I knew that it was supposedly in a Mew's instincts to be, well, playful as a kitten. I knew _something_ had to have happened to change that in this Mew. I assumed she would tell us when she wanted. If she wanted. Believe me, I know not to mess with a Legendary or get in its personal space. I-I mean, you don't want to mess with a Legendary, right? Everyone knows that, it's common knowledge. Yeah. A blue light started emanating from Mew's body and her eyes glowed. _What's she doing now?_

(Back in Tranquil Town, Raptor's POV)

I had explored the town and the surrounding dungeons, memorizing everything I saw. I had also gotten to know all the folks in the town. They were all very nice. Especially the kids! I was finally living my dream; for future generations to get to enjoy my history lessons. I was talking to those nice Pidgeotto and Pidgey, who seemed to be getting worried about the KantoPals.

"They should have been back hours ago… It's nearly midnight…"

"I'm sure they're fine. Those kids are a lot tougher than they look, believe me."

"Yeah, but still… don't you think we ought to be at least a little worried? I mean, I know they saved Pidgey and all, but it shouldn't be taking them this long."

_That may be true, but I'm sure they're alright. Perhaps they already found the map and are going ahead to the Ravaged Ruins… No, that's ridiculous; they wouldn't leave without me._

_They certainly would not._

_What the—Mew?_

_The one and only. I am communicating with you through Telepathy. They have found the map. I would greatly prefer if you would meet us at the castle entrance after I teleport everyone outside._

_Uh… sure…_

_Good. We will be waiting for you. _

Well. I certainly didn't see that coming. But, that's Mew for you. When she tells you to do something, you do it—no questions asked. I sighed, explained the situation to the bird Pokémon brothers, and flew off towards the fallen castle.

(Black Woods Castle entrance, Satoshi's POV)

Mew had teleported us all out of the castle and told us to wait. Char wanted to ask what we were waiting for, but I told him not to question and just do as he's told. He shut his mouth and waited with the rest of us. We waited for about ten minutes. We were so tired and all we wanted to do was sleep, but just when we thought we couldn't take anymore, we heard a roar off in the distance.

"_Aerrroooooooooo!"_

We saw Raptor flying towards us at an almost alarming speed. Luckily, he slowed down in time and landed gracefully in front of us.

"Just climb on my back, point the way, and I'll get you there by sunrise."

"Alright, thanks Raptor. The ruins are about 25 miles in that direction." I pointed north-west and we climbed on his back.

"And don't worry about hanging on. I have a perfect flight record, so just relax and try to get some sleep." I hoped he wasn't just saying that because we were his first passengers, but I didn't know for sure so I decided to trust him.

Mew flew alongside Raptor as he glided through the sky. The others were already sound asleep. I was close to falling asleep too, but not before thinking to myself a bit.

_Better watch out, Clone, 'cause we're coming for you!_

(Cryptic Tower Pinnacle, ?'s POV)

I heard the unintended message, for I am the most powerful Psychic Type this world has ever seen! I chuckled and said to no one in particular,

"Bring your best; I am ready for anything you can throw at me!"

I chuckled, which soon turned into a maniacal evil laugh.

"HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA!"

End of Chapter

Me: Alright, so that ends chapter 9. Did you guys like it?

Everyone: YEP!

Me: Great! So, like I said, the gory stuff is a onetime thing, and I know that flashback was really dramatic, but I hope you liked it! So, there was also a sad romance moment, and there's probably only going to be one or two more of those in this fanfic. Well, it is a friendship/adventure story. Not a lot of romance in this one. But, when there is, I'll try my best to make it good! Oh, some of you might be surprised by Mew's personality, but there _is_ a reason for that. But, I'm not saying a word yet. So, please look forward to Chapter 10, and that'll hopefully be up sooner than usual.

Satoshi: Don't count on it. By the way, Mew is very serious, and when she tells you to do something, you do it, no arguments. Or she gets pretty scary. *turns to me* Just like you say your mom is—

Me: Okay, that's enough out of you. *pushes him into the wall*

Storm: Yeah, alright. Now, here's the gist. Every morning, when our master wakes up, she checks the story to see if there are any changes. Now, if she checks tomorrow and there isn't a single new Review, the Pikachu gets it! *grabs Satoshi by the throat*

Satoshi: Urgh… you're… choking… me…

Ash: *whispers to Yuma* Remind me never to get him angry.

Yuma: *whispers to Ash* Noted.

Me: *takes a breathe* Look, Storm, I appreciate that you're trying to help, but—

Storm: But what? You've tried friendly reminders, asking nicely, and pretty much demanding Reviews. We've all seen how great that's been working. Frankly, it's just starting to look pathetic.

Me: Yes, that's true, but I'm not _that _desperate. And besides, Zoroark aren't bullies.

Storm: …Fine… *drops Satoshi*

Satoshi: *gasps for air* Boy… that Zoroark… has a strong grip.

Me: Sorry about that. And yes, Storm is also one of my Pokémon, and he is a Zoroark. So, ignoring that ridiculous 'threat' from Storm, please write your Review in the little box down there. BraviaryGirl7 out!


	10. Chapter 10: The Red Core

Me: Alright, I've finally worked almost everything out! If I want the Vulpix Tail series to be finished by Explorers of Light Book 4, all I have to do is finish 2 Vulpix Tails with every Light book. So, got to update Vulpix Tail more often.

Buizel: So, that means, if the goal is Christmas, you have to post once a week, and get two Vulpix Tails done with each Explorers of Light. That is a lot of writing.

Me: *sigh* I know… It's going to be a busy eleven weeks… Anyway, I'm really excited for this chapter. Hope you like this, please Review. I don't own Pokémon, so on to Chapter 10!

Chapter 10

(Satoshi's POV)

I woke up and rubbed my eyes, and saw we were still flying over the vast wasteland of ruined buildings and villages, and I could tell we were getting close. Closer to getting to Cryptic tower… and closer to stopping Clone. But… I still can't help but feel that I shouldn't be dragging my friends into this… Clone is very dangerous, and there's no telling what he'll do to my friends if they get in his way. In fact, the reason Clone targeted the Valley of Peace after so long is because I finally made it there… That's right; it's my fault they're in danger. I looked to the side and saw that Mew was still floating alongside Raptor. But, she looked like she didn't get any sleep; well, she probably didn't, given that she was still floating at the same speed as Raptor was flying. But, despite all her best efforts to conceal it, I could tell that flying all night had really taken its toll on her. She was flying slightly slower than she was last night, and was quite a bit lower. Not to mention, her eyes seemed almost bloodshot, and her lower eyelids were slightly black. (You know, like when people don't get enough sleep, the parts under their eyes turn black, and get baggy, that thing.) Her tail was drooping downward, as well as her arms and legs. I felt kind of bad; she had to keep flying until we got to the ruins, and we had gotten plenty of sleep. And, if I know Mew, she's probably been up several nights, monitoring who knows what. I know there's a reason for that; I just don't know what it is… Though, I wish I knew what it was…

I soon saw the piles of ancient litter growing in size and expanding in space. Soon enough, we were flying directly over another ancient city, the only difference between this one and The Nation of the Umbra was that this one wasn't charred and broken; this one was just crumbled mainly because of the whole 'time has taken its toll' thing. Raptor started to descend along with Mew. I carefully walked over to the others, trying not to go flying off. I shook Char, waking him up and told him,

"Come on, wake up. We're almost there." He groggily nodded, and shook Hydro and Venus. They woke up, and noticed our descent. We landed, and got off of Raptor, who looked amazingly not tired at all. I guess if I had been sleeping for 3,000 years would make me not need to sleep either. Can't say the same for Mew though… As soon as we landed, she got really close to the ground… in fact; she landed as well, feet on the ground and everything. I wanted to ask her if she needed to rest, but that might not be such a good idea. While I was in the middle of debating that, my thoughts were interrupted by one of the usual questions from Char.

"So, what is it that we're supposed to be looking for exactly?" I honestly had no idea, so for once I couldn't answer his question. I turned to Mew, who answered,

"All I know is that it is an object that will not only allow us to locate Clone, but it will also grant an amazing power to the one it deems worthy. However, where it is hidden I do not know. I also can honestly say that I do not know what it is, or what kind of power it possesses. Nor do I know just how powerful it is. Well, we are not going to find it just sitting around like a herd of Snorlax; let us get moving!" Ugh… typical Mew… This is going to be a really long trip… I mean, you can put up with that kind of attitude for only so long! This had better be over soon…

So, we all started walking through the ruins. (And I mean all of us. Mew was walking too, on her hind legs.) We passed through the crumbled buildings, and I have to say, it was really amazing! It wasn't creepy like the other ruins, but more like fascinating, as it was filled with old paintings of ancient battles and historic moments; like whole cities being founded by very few Pokémon, and skyrocketing in population and eventually becoming huge bustling cities. Huge wars were put to stop by very tiny Pokémon. Amazing things… So many amazing things… and so little time… We had to hurry and find the… the… the whatever it is.

We kept walking through the fossilized city for what seemed like hours, seeing more and more drawings of incredible accomplishments… but couldn't stop to admire them…

"Come on, enough lollygagging! We need to keep looking, alright?"

Alright, by now, I wasn't the only one annoyed by this. I could tell the others were too. I would have told them to just keep walking and try to ignore the annoying attitude, but then, Char just went and put his foot in it, or however that saying goes.

"Jeez, why are you so uptight? Why are you acting like we've got a time limit or something? It's almost like you know something we don't… something important… You do, don't you? You know something that we don't know, right? What is it? If it's important, shouldn't we know about it? Because, I think—Urgh…" The only reason he stopped was because by now Mew had gotten as annoyed by Char's questions as she had annoyed us with her attitude and had used Psychic to make him… well… pretty much shut up.

"Do you really want to know? Do you think you _really _want to know?" Again with the clichés… and I don't even know what that one's from… Nevertheless, we all looked at her with a look that so obviously said 'Yes!' I nodded just to make sure she'd get the message. She sighed, she knew she was defeated.

"Fine… There _is_ something I have been hiding… Clone's plans… for complete world destruction…" We all gasped in shock!

"What?! I-I never thought Clone would go that far!" Mew sighed again.

"Neither did I… but alas… he has a plan that may mean the destruction of the entire world… He is building a weapon of destruction, but I am afraid I do not know much about it…" I raised my eyebrow… or whatever it is. She looked around, and gave a look that said 'what?' Soon after, she sighed one more time and knew she wasn't hiding anything important from us anymore.

"… Fine… It is an incredibly powerful super weapon… It runs on the immense power that Clone possesses alone… I do not know for sure what kind of power it runs on, but I know that if it is completed and is used, it would cause such utter devastation, there may not be any survivors." Alright, now I was mad! And not just at Clone! Why in the whole wide world of Mystery Dungeon had Mew kept this from us?!

"Uh-huh… and just when were you going to tell us this?! That seems kind of important for us to know! I mean, we're the ones who have got to stop the guy!" I know that might have been a bit uncalled for, but for crying out loud, we have to know what we have to stop, right? But, on second thought… when I saw her cringe, I knew something had to be tied to Clone that was… tough to talk about.

"Well, I was going to tell you, but… well… Uh, hey! Where are you going?!" I noticed Char had wandered off somewhere. "Urgh! Seriously! If you are going to pester me until I tell you something I may not want to talk about, the least you could do is actually listen!" Even I have to admit, that's out of character for him. I wondered about it for a bit, when I heard him say,

"Whoa, too cool! Guys, come here, look at this!" I looked at the others, who just shrugged in response. We started to go and see what all the fuss was about anyway.

We walked through the hall Char had gone through, and what we saw topped everything we had seen so far by a landslide! There were pictures on the walls, but not like the ones before. These were pictures of the most interesting—if not incredible—things we'd ever seen!

The pictures were divided up into three parts, all seemed to be according to 'category'. The right half of the drawings had pictures of some familiar creatures; one of which I recognized to be a Pikachu. It was in Battle Position, and around its neck was a pendent of some sort. It was a medium sized sphere attached to a string. Behind the Pikachu was a very strange looking creature; it was bipedal, and had extremely long legs and arms. Its appearance was almost… humanoid. Wait, could it be?

"Is that… a human?" The others looked at me like I was crazy, except Mew and Raptor.

"It would appear so. Humans do not just exist in fairy tales, you know. According to this, they exist in several worlds; a world where humans and Pokémon coexist, and a world… with no Pokémon." It was true, that was what the writing said. But… a world… without us? I mean, the world where we coexist with the humans is believable; humans are probably relying on us for a lot of things, but a world without us Pokémon? How do the humans survive? It makes no sense… Wanting to know more about this coexisting world, I kept reading the right half of the wall.

Apparently, these humans use tools to claim ownership to us Pokémon, like these balls with the buttons on them. They hardly ever used oil lamps to light their houses, they used electricity to light their homes, and the electricity was produced by Pokémon! See, that's believable, but, seriously, how do the humans in that other world get along without us? Anyway, the humans in the first mentioned world also use electricity for things other than just lighting their homes; for instance, they use it to have running water in their homes as well! What will they think of next? …Apparently they also thought of vehicles that transport them very long distances that were powered by gas. And then, longer bodied vehicles that would fit several humans in them at once. There were also large metal vehicles that traveled on water. And, there was even a section about these huge machines the transport people through the sky! This was truly nothing short of amazing! But, if that's not enough, there was also a part written about the relationship between the humans and the Pokémon. Apparently, humans own Pokémon, and do many things alongside them as partners and friends. Sometimes, they play together, at other times, they work together. Some humans raise their Pokémon partners to be stronger, and battle with other humans and their partners. The stronger the Pokémon grow, the farther the humans' careers as 'trainers' go. Some humans even travel around the regions, and challenge these guys called Gym Leaders to a battle, and if they win, they earn one of the eight Gym Badges required to compete in the Pokémon League. When they compete in the league, they get the chance to battle the very best trainers in the region. If they are able to win, they become known as Champion, and their data is put into the Hall of Fame. …According to this, that is. What were even more interesting though, were the drawings of the adventures of this particular human boy wearing the cap, and his Pikachu partner. (Quick A/N, You all know who I'm talking about!) He has seen the Winged Legends fighting over their territory, and helped to put a stop to that fighting along with the Guardian of the Sea; Lugia! In another part, they battle out of control Unown before they turn everything into a barren crystal wasteland; working along with an Entei conjured by the Unown. In another section, they work with a Suicune and a boy from the past to save the Time Travel Pokémon, Celebi, from an evil human! Another section, they work with the Eon Pokémon, Latias and Latios, to save an entire town from a corrupted human girl, who unleashes two corrupted Pokémon on the town, and later the Eon twins use their power to save the town from a tsunami wave! Sadly, it also says that the Latios sacrificed himself to save the town… In another part, it says they helped the wish Pokémon, Jirachi, to save its home from a monster version of Groudon, the Continent Pokémon, which was created by a well-meaning human who sought revenge against other humans. In the next part, they help reunite and save two Deoxys friends from an angry Rayquaza who thought the Deoxys were its enemies, until they protected it from drowning in a barrage of blocks. (And that's no lie!) Next part, the human awakens a Lucario that has been asleep for decades, while his partner, Pikachu, gets kidnapped by a playful Mew after the Mew was attacked by two Weavile. The human works together with the Lucario to get his partner back, and on the way to the place Mew took Pikachu; the Tree of Beginning; they get attacked by a Regirock, Regice, and Registeel, who are really just doing their job and protecting the tree. The human eventually finds Pikachu, but soon after gets 'eaten' by one of the trees' antibodies. Pikachu mourns, and Mew uses its power to revive the human, but becomes very weak, and close to dying, as well as the tree. The human and Lucario travel to the Heart of the Tree, and use the power of Aura to give Mew power and save the tree! But, sadly, Lucario ends up sacrificing himself, and now rests with his partner… In the next part, one of the human's traveling companions hatches the egg of a Mythical Pokémon, Manaphy, the Prince of the Sea. As the human girl spent time the baby Pokémon, she formed a tight bond with it, and when the prince's home was in danger, its true power of leadership was showed as it commanded even the great Kyogre to attack the evil human who tried to take the treasure of its home. In the end, the battle was won, and the human girl and the young prince shared a bittersweet goodbye. Next part, the human and Pikachu try to stop a Darkrai from sending everyone into a nightmare. Meanwhile, the Time and Space gods were fighting to the death because they each thought the other was invading their territory. Their fighting almost destroyed an entire town, and everyone in it. But, Darkrai, who—as it turns out—was actually just trying to warn the citizens about Dialga and Palkia, sacrificed himself to buy the heroes time to get the rampaging legends to calm down with a song loud enough for them to hear. After calming down, the legends returned to their homes. Next part, the duo meets the Gratitude Pokémon, Shaymin, and agrees to help it get back to its friends. Unfortunately, they ran into trouble with the Renegade Pokémon, Giratina, who wanted Shaymin so it could get out of the Reverse World and get revenge on Dialga and Palkia, whose fighting messed up its world quite a bit. But, Giratina was captured by a human whose intentions were good, sort of, but was going to kill Giratina to get its data. They were able to save Giratina, but not before the other human got into the Reverse World and tried to get rid of them. They stopped him that time too, and finally got Shaymin reunited with its friends and Giratina returned home. In the next part, the duo has a close call, where Pikachu is almost sucked up by a strange vortex! Luckily, he is saved when a human girl with strange powers calls for help from Dialga! Soon after though, Dialga was attacked by Giratina again, but saved by Palkia, and afterwards, Giratina is calmed down by the hero and they leave. Soon though, it is explained that Arceus, the god of all Pokémon, who was betrayed in the past, is going to destroy mankind! The heroes traveled to the past to try and stop it from happening in the first place with the help of Dialga. They meet the human who betrayed Arceus, and discover that it was another human who hypnotized the first human so he could keep the Jewel of Life so the land would flourish, but was informed of the future and almost killed Arceus, but the human hero returned the Jewel, and the good past human calmed it down before it destroyed the shrine they were in, and all the Pokémon that were being controlled by the bad human. As the shrine almost crumbled, Arceus recognized the heroes as its friends and saved all of them from falling to their deaths, and the heroes returned to their time. They find Arceus stopping its rampage, and that the land is still fertile, despite returning the Jewel of Life because the humans worked very hard to keep it that way. They soon find a plaque to them from the past humans to honor their bravery. In the next part, the heroes meet a lost Zorua who is trying to find its Zoroark friend after they were both taken by a bad human. Zorua (Let's just say Zorua is a male) is lucky to escape, but the human lets Zoroark (Let's just say Zoroark is female) think that they still have him so she will do what he says. He makes her use her ability, Illusion, to fool the humans into thinking Raikou, Entei, and Suicune, the guardians of the town, are the ones attacking everybody. The bad human later made everyone think the legends were under the control of Zoroark, who he says is an evil Pokémon, because he wants to capture Celebi for his own purposes. The heroes are locked up by the human while Pikachu and Zorua are able to get away and meet Celebi. They agree to help each other, as Celebi and Zorua both want to get back to their homes. Meanwhile, the heroes are helped by the bad human's 'assistant' who turns out to be a double agent and helps them find the Pokémon, while the bad human uses Zoroark to make it so that the real legendary beasts can't move. Zorua attacks the human, and he's prone to illusions. The human is defeated, but Zoroark gets really injured, but manages to pull through. In the end, the bad human is put in jail; Celebi gets back to its home, and Zorua and Zoroark go back home. The next part, the heroes meet the Victory Pokémon, Victini, and the Legendary Pokémon, Reshiram and Zekrom, and a human with good intentions who wants to use Victini's power to move the castle back to where it used to be, but in doing so, almost killed Victini and messed up the Dragon Force, the energy that keeps the land in balance. Luckily, the hero saved Victini who moved the castle back to the right place, nearly using all its power. Luckily, it survived and went to continue reviving the land. The next part, the heroes meet the Colt Pokémon, Keldeo, who ran from a battle with Kyurem, whom he challenged recklessly to try and become a Sword of Justice, but promptly lost. Enraged at this act of cowardice, not to mention Keldeo lying to him, Kyurem froze the Swords of Justice, Cobalion, Terrakion, and Virizion, chased after Keldeo and the heroes help him to get away from it, and eventually helping him overcome his fear. He challenged Kyurem again, and the heroes freed the Swords of Justice, and Keldeo lost the battle, but Kyurem deemed him worthy of becoming a Sword of Justice. That seemed to be the end of the drawings on the right. As for the drawings on the left, they were pictures of the humans in this supposed 'world without Pokémon', and it turns out… I was wrong. The adventures of these humans were just as amazing as the ones on the right side! The humans apparently used the combined power of playing cards that seem to be more than just a game, and some kind of ancient magic, several thousand years old to be exact, and on the top, it showed a picture of a human teaming up with, and I quote, 'a ghostly visitor from another world'. They had very many adventures and seem to have saved their own world many times! The pictures on the bottom showed two humans that looked very similar; mostly the same eyes, although the eyes of the taller human made him look more confident than the shorter human, they also had the same spiky hair. The taller human wore a pendant around his neck; some sort of three dimensional triangle with the pattern of an eye on one side. (If you watch Yu-Gi-Oh and Yu-Gi-Oh Zexal you know who I'm talking about here too! If you don't, just don't worry about it.)

After looking at that for a while longer, we continued down the hall, glancing every now and then at the drawings on the wall and seeing what kind of things we could learn, when we eventually came to a very large room. It was at this point that the drawings of the humans had ended and were replaced by the same two words that kept repeating over and over: Pure Light. Up ahead was a stairway leading to a slightly elevated pedestal, on which rested a strange object that I couldn't quite make out from where I was. For some reason, I was drawn to it, like I was in a trance. I walked up the stairway and stopped in front of the pedestal, and realized it was some sort of small red sphere about the size of my cheeks. It was glowing slightly on the inside and when I reached out to touch it, it glowed even brighter, and I could have sworn that I heard another voice emanating from somewhere.

_Stop the darkness before it is too late. Take the power and accept your fate._

By now, I wasn't freaked out by this, if you can believe it. I felt a surge of power flow through my body as I gently place a finger on the sphere, and it glowed brightly as I grabbed it and held it, and I felt the power surge through me; power that was unfamiliar to me, but it still felt so… right. Suddenly, there was a blinding light!

The next thing I knew, I was surrounded by light, the ground didn't even seem to be there. I looked around, and for a while nothing changed, when I heard the same mysterious voice.

"Welcome, O Chosen One."

"Uh… are… are you talking to me?"

"Yes. Allow me to explain." The mysterious orb like object appeared in front of me. "This is a piece… of the Sacred Core of Light."

"Sacred Core? What's that?"

"The Core is the physical form of the power of Pure Light."

"Uh, what's Pure Light?"

"Pure Light is… well, it is hard to explain. Hmm… Let me put it this way. Take all that is good in the world; happiness, kindness, love, compassion, care, friendship. Pure Light gathers the power from those forms of light, and allows the one it deems worthy incredible power… powers beyond anything you could ever imagine. And, it would seem that this piece has chosen you." The sphere floated over to me, and I cupped my hands and let it slowly descend into my paws. I held it gently like the precious item it was. Honestly, I didn't quite get what it was, but I could just tell it was special. Wait… did the voice say 'this piece'?

"What do you mean, 'this piece'? Are there other pieces besides this one?"

"Yes, six others to be exact. Long ago, the original Core shattered into seven pieces, one of which you hold in your paws." I looked back down at the Core piece and then back up to… the spot in front of me. Well, what else was I supposed to do? The thing that was talking to me wasn't anywhere to be seen, but its voice seemed to be coming from everywhere at once, and yet, nowhere. Anyway, I looked in front of me and said,

"Well, should I be looking for the other pieces?"

"No. The ones worthy of the other pieces will locate them when the time comes. In the meantime, this one has chosen you worthy of its power, and believe me when I tell you, it will be necessary for you to fulfil your destiny. However, you must choose to accept the power before it will open up to you. Do you accept it?"

"… Yes. If this will help, if this is what it takes to fulfil my destiny… I'll do it."

"Good."

"One more thing… how do I get it to work? And what does it do exactly?"

"That is something you will discover when the time comes. Now, I must take my leave, brave little warrior." The light vanished, and I was back in the real world. I was holding the red core piece in my paws, and it was still glowing, but not as brightly as before.

"Whoa, totally weird." I suddenly felt something tugging at me to go outside. I looked back down at the core piece, which I assumed the sensation was coming from. I walked back down the stairs, and looked to the other side of the room. There was another exit, and it seemed to be where the thing was trying to lead me. I waved my paw to the others in a way that told them to follow me. They were a bit hesitant, but followed nevertheless as I led them outside, and for whatever reason, the land touched the ocean here. Not to mention, it was already dark, and the stars were already out. Don't get how this day could get any weirder than it already has. I felt the thing tugging at me to cross the ocean, but I couldn't see anything beyond ten feet. Then, the core piece flashed, and I could see far away for some reason, like the darkness wasn't restraining me anymore. I could even see what seemed to be a… floating island! Then, something just told me what to do.

"We need to get to that island."

"Uh… what island? You can see in this light, or should I say lack of light?"

"Uh, yeah, somehow I can." I turned to Raptor. "Raptor, can you get us there?"

"How far away is it? I can't see in this either."

"I'll tell you where to go." The others got on Raptor, but Mew looked skeptical.

"Are you sure you know what you are doing?"

"Not entirely, it's just a feeling… but a really strong one. So, I think I should go with it."

"…Okay… Then let us get going—Agh!" She tried to fly, but she seemed to have used up all her strength. I walked over to her, and helped her up.

"You know Mew, you don't have to fly everywhere on your own. What I mean is, there's always room on my back for one more." Mew was a bit hesitant, but got on with us. Raptor took off, and in in half an hour, we reached the island.

"Mew, what is this place?"

"… Psywave Isle. The land that holds the base of Cryptic Tower." I looked over to the others, and everyone looked exhausted.

"Let's camp here for the night. We'll start again in the morning."

"Uh, but won't Clone know we're here?" Mew shook her head.

"I can use my Psychic powers to allow us to avoid detection. And, I will be able to rest as well." We nodded, set up beds with what we could, and soon fell asleep. But, all the while, I was wondering what Clone's weapon could be…

End of Chapter

Me: Alright, we're finally done with this chapter! I really like this one, but I made it quite a bit longer than I meant it to be. Ah, well. Anyway, you're probably wondering about the pictures in the ruins. That is just a bit of a tribute to my three favorite shows, and as for the movies with Mewtwo in them, there's a reason I didn't include them in the 'tribute'. The reason is… I'm not going to give away that yet! Ha ha! Anyway, if you don't watch Yu-Gi-Oh or Yu-Gi-Oh Zexal, don't worry about it. But, if you're reading this, you probably watch Pokémon. And, in the future, I'm going to make a Crossover with Pokémon/Yu-Gi-Oh/Yu-Gi-Oh Zexal, and the four main heroes in Yu-Gi-Oh will be in it, as well as the two main characters in Yu-Gi-Oh Zexal, and of course, Ash and Pikachu, and a few of my own OCs: Riolu, Pichu, Eevee, and Zora the Zorua. Quick character bios! Riolu is a serious and loyal Pokémon with powerful psychic and aura powers. He's a bit hot-headed at times, but he is a great friend in a jam. Pichu is a care-free joker who loves to pull pranks, and was born with large ears, even for a Pichu, no offense. He eventually learned to use his ears to his advantage, and fly! His small size and incredible speed come in very handy in battle. Eevee is the motherly type of Pokémon. She will stop a fight when it gets out of hand, and cares deeply about all her friends. She's got a wide variety of helpful moves that assist in battle. Zora is the kind, sensitive type. She's Pichu's best friend and will help him with a prank if he can convince her; which is kind of often. She knows many powerful moves, and although she is easily scared, she will help her friends however she can. Alright, that's done, so back to the funny. So, recently, I was reading SnivyPro18's 'Imagine', and he's got a character that really reminds me of Yuma. Ryan the Riolu.

Yuma: Uh, how does he remind you of me exactly?

Zora: Oh, I know! He deals with problems when he comes to them, he's really cheerful, and not to mention clumsy.

Yuma: Hey! I'm not clumsy!

*clattering in the background*

Zora: Well… actually…

Yuma: I am not!

Pichu: *snickers* Hey Yuma! Over here!

Yuma: Hold that thought. What is it?

Pichu: A little closer, aaaand…. Soap bar!

Yuma: Huh? Whoa! *slips on a soap bar*

Pichu: Wet floor!

Yuma: Aaaaaaaah!

Pichu: Bucket of water!

Yuma: Can't see!

Pichu: Speed bump!

*donk*

Yuma: Ah! *lands in a wading pool*

Pichu: *laughing hysterically*

Me: Yeah… not clumsy at all. Anyway, please Review. BraviaryGirl7 out!


	11. Chapter 11: Through Psywave Isle

Me: Alright, hopefully the last chapter wasn't too bad.

Yuma: Speak for yourself! What was in that pool anyway?

Pichu: Berry Juice. Speaking of which… *Blows into a dog whistle*

*Bark, Bark bark.*

Yuma: *gets licked by a bunch of dog Pokémon* Hey, get off! That tickles! Stop it!

Ash: That's what you get for being clumsy.

Yuma: Hey, don't start that again!

Me: *sigh* When I get started with that fanfic, you'll find that these two will be fighting quite a lot. Pichu, did you really have to do that?

Pichu: Um… yep.

Me: Fine, fair enough. In this chapter, the heroes will go through Psywave Isle. Let's see… anything else?

Chokka: Ahem.

Me: Oh yeah! Just want to clear something up, the way Chokka's name is pronounced, it's probably hard to tell because of how it's spelled, but it rhymes with mocha.

Chokka: Thank you. BraviaryGirl7 does not own Pokémon or Yu-Gi-Oh.

Me: Right, now without further ado, to the chapter!

Chapter 11

(Satoshi's POV)

We all woke up, still on the floating island in the sky. Without even eating anything, we packed up camp and began to go up the Psywave dungeon. _We're so close… So close… _I looked up the long climb ahead of us, and all I could think about was getting to Cryptic Tower. That was the next step. We prepared with what we could using the Kangaskhan Rock that was located near the entrance of the dungeon, and went into the dungeon.

As we entered the dungeon, I felt that weird tugging sensation growing stronger. We ended up in a large room filled with green grass, and berries. On the other side of the room, there was an aggressive looking Abra. It Teleported close to us, and prepared to use Psychic! But, I quickly slammed it with an Iron Tail, which stunned it for a second, giving me more than enough time to knock it out with an Electro Ball! The Abra fainted and I saw it drop some kind if box as it vanished. I picked it up, and inspected it. It was very glittery and shiny, and when I shook it, it rattled a bit.

"What is this?" Mew answered for me with her usual annoyance.

"That would be a Treasure Box. Occasionally, enemies will drop them after being defeated, though I would expect you to know that." I growled a bit. "But, since you do not, I will elaborate. Treasure Boxes contain items, and sometimes, they contain rare items, like Exclusive Items. However, you would usually need a Psychic Type, or a very large amount of brute force to get it open." I shrugged and put it into the bag. I would have liked to get it open, but this wasn't the time for that. I led the others into the path on the other side of the room, which was actually pretty dark. We walked through the dimly lit path, with Char walking right behind me, holding his tail up so I could see where I was going. We came to another room with nothing but a Wonder Tile on the far side of it, as well as another path leading out of the room. We walked through the path and ran into an Exeggcute which was easily knocked out by Char's Ember. …Which also lightly grazed my shoulder. He apologized, and we went into the next room. This room had the stairs, so we went to the next floor.

Knowing nothing about this dungeon, I did a little inquiry. "Mew, how many floors are in this dungeon?"

"If my calculations are correct… 17." What?! 17 floors?! Ugh! Like I said before, it's going to be a long trip… at least this part will be, anyway. I looked around the room we ended up in, and noticed we were in a slightly smaller room than before. In the top right corner was a Stick (4) and next to it, a path leading out of here. We took it, and soon came to the room with the stairs in them, with a Gloom sleeping right on top of them. Venus fired 5 Bullet Seeds, which startled it awake and soon after knocked it out. We went to the stairs and moved on to the next floor.

"So, Satoshi, when did you learn Electro Ball?"

"About a week ago I think. Come on, let's go." We walked through the path on the side of the room we were on, and ran into a Slowpoke, which I easily knocked out with a Thunder Shock, mostly because it was so unaware of what was going on, it forgot to make a move. Oh, well. We came to an intersection, and turned right to see where that would lead. We came to a room that was an empty dead end with absolutely nothing in it. Well, can't expect to find the stairs on the first try every time. We went back to the intersection and continued down the other path. We ran into a Psyduck who didn't seem nearly as….. forgetful as the one we had saved that time. It used Confusion, which gave me a headache. I almost got confused, but I heard my friends voice concern, and I got my focus back and Electro Balled it, knocking it out. We continued down and came to the room with the stairs and an orb next to them. I picked up the orb, which turned out to be a Blowback Orb, and moved onto the stairs.

We ended up in the room with the stairs in them, but there were several enemies in the room as well, all surrounding us. There was a Weepinbell, a Drowzee, and a Tangela. I used Iron Tail on the Drowzee, and Char used Ember on the Tangela, and Hydro used Skull Bash on the Weepinbell. The attacks stunned them for a few seconds, but then they got right back up! They kept coming closer and closer, until Raptor told us to cover our ears and used the move Roar!

"AAEEEERRRRRROOOOOOO!" The three Pokémon were sent flying into the far walls, and it must have hurt more than normal because they soon fainted on the floor. I wasn't surprised—I was still holding my head in pain because of my sensitive hearing. And it was also because of the fact that I wasn't able to cover my ears in time. Who knew that an Aerodactyl can have such a loud roar? Once I got my hearing back, we moved to the next floor before any more enemies could find us.

I was still a bit dizzy, but kept going just fine. We ended up in a room with a bunch of berries in it, one blue (Oran), one pink (Pecha), one red (Cheri), one light blue (Rawst), and one dark blue (Chesto). We picked them up, and lo and behold, in the far corner of the room, there was a berry that seemed to be colored gold! It was a Sitrus Berry! A berry that completely restores HP, and if it's already full, it raises your maximum HP! But… what was one doing here? Sitrus Berries are extremely rare, and why would there be one here; in a dungeon that rests right below Cryptic Tower, Clone's base? Perhaps it's just a completely random thing, or a slip-up, or perhaps it was on purpose. Oh, well. Whatever the reason, we best not look the gift Rapidash in the mouth. We went through the path near the spot the berry was in, and walked until we came to the room with the stairs in them and moved to the next floor.

The dungeon layout started to change, as the grass seemed to be getting taller and greener. And, there also seemed to be many kinds of flowers that spread out across the room. There were orange ones, and red ones and yellow ones all in different places in the room. I would have liked to admire the scenery, but we were getting so close. We went through the path on the left side of the room, and noticed the hall was getting darker and harder and harder to see a foot in front of us. We soon made it to the next room which contained another Gloom which I ran straight into, and it used Toxic on me. Char knocked it out with a Flame Burst attack and went to help me. He gave me the Pecha Berry we found on the previous floor, and I felt my power come back almost instantly. I got up and thanked him, and saw the stairs in the far corner of the room, so we went up to the next floor.

We landed in a small room with almost nothing in it except a Wonder Tile. We went through the path leading out of the room, and ran into two Exeggcute, but I took them out with two quick Electro Balls and we continued down the hall. We came to a room with just some Poké coins scattered nearby, which added up to about 87 Poké. We went to the next room which just had a seed in it, and that turned out to be a rare Reviver Seed! We picked it up and went to the next room, which finally had the stairs, so we moved on to floor 9.

We ended up in the room with the stairs in them, but unfortunately, it turned out to be a Monster House, with about 15 Pokémon surrounding us and about to attack! We battled them, fighting as hard as we could with Thunder Shocks and Fire Fangs and Water Guns and Vine Whips and Wing Attacks, defeating most of them fairly quickly, but more enemies came through and just kept coming.

We were getting pretty tired, so I just used Discharge to knock them all out and we moved to the next floor, which was the midpoint, thank goodness. We all took a rest, and recovered as quickly as we could. We prepared by replacing anything we had used in the first half of the dungeon, and moved to the next half of the dungeon, Psywave Highlands.

The dungeon layout changed greatly, as the grass was almost completely gone at this altitude, and no flowers either. Just grey stone, and some very tiny blades of wilted yellow grass, along with even a few dead clumps of brown grass here and there. We traveled through the path on the other side of the room, and ran into a Kadabra which prepared to use Psycho Cut, and cut me right where that Ekans bit me!

"AARRGH!" I staggered backward, weak from the old injury being opened up by the strong attack, but soon recovered and slammed it with an Iron Tail, and followed it up with an Electro Ball, nearly knocking it out, so I finished it off with a regular attack. We continued down the hall, and soon came to the room with the stairs in them, and moved on.

We ended up in a medium sized room. Nothing in it except two Wonder Tiles and a Stick (4). We went through the path, and came to another empty room, with two paths leading out, I chose the path leading north, or at least I think that's what that direction was. Hard to tell when you don't have a compass or trees. (A/N: It is actually possible to figure out which way is north in the forest area, because the most moss grows on the north side of the tree.) Anyway, I chose that path, which turned out to be the right choice, as the room contained the stairs, and an extra Oran Berry, which I ate and soon felt better from the Psycho Cut, and we moved on.

We ended up in the top right room, and took the path that led south. We soon came to a room smaller than the last one, and another intersection, and took the one leading east. This led to the room with the stairs in them, but had a Weepinbell blocking the way. It was about to use Sludge Bomb, so I used a combo I had been working on for a while: first, I charge up an Iron Tail. Then, while it's charging up, I use Quick Attack to slam into the foe. By now, the attack is charged up, so I use it to follow up. Pretty sweet, right? The combo knocked it out, and we moved to the next floor.

We ended up in what seemed to be the bottom right corner of the floor, and I chose the path leading north. When we came to an intersection, I chose the one leading west. It led to an empty room. …What? Hey, sometimes a leader's instincts are right, and sometimes they're wrong. Regardless, I lead the others further west, and then down south, and we came to the stairs.

This time, I think we ended up in the bottom left corner of the floor. I led the team north, and then east. We ran into a Slowbro, but I knocked it out with an Electro Ball. We soon came to the room with the stairs in them and moved on.

We ended up in the middle of the floor, and I chose the path that led north. We came to an intersection, and I chose the path leading to the right, and then to the south. We ran into a Monster House, with a Hypno, an Exeggutor, a Mr. Mime, a Jynx, a Starmie, a Slowbro, and an Alakazam. I used Discharge, knocking out the Starmie and Slowbro and damaging the rest of them. The others were tired, except Mew, who used Psychic to knock them out, so we moved on to the stairs which were located in the room.

We were finally at the end of the dungeon. I looked off into the distance, and saw what appeared to be a tower.

"Cryptic Tower. We're almost there." Suddenly, I heard the sound of wings flapping. I saw something fly off of the tower, three things actually. They flew towards us, and when they landed, they were revealed to be… Articuno, Zapdos, and Moltres! I noticed their eyes were… different. It was almost like….. soulless! But there were not even any scratches on their bodies, not a single one. It was like they were being… controlled… They each let out a shriek, and prepared to attack!

End of Chapter

Me: Cliffhanger! Nah, I'm just kidding. This is a double update, so you'll find out what happens to our heroes once you start to read the next chapter. That will probably be kind of short, too.

Yuma: Ugh, I'm all wet!

Me: Ooh, I got it! Talk about getting attacked by 'RUFF'-ians! Oh, I got another one! You really got ruffed up! Ha ha! One more! Good thing it wasn't cats, because their tongues are really ruff! …No? No, you're right; I should have stuck with the first two.

Yuma: Very funny.

Me: Okay, one more thing, I know that in every Pokémon game, Mew is pink, but in the first MOVIE, it's white. So, I just went along with that. Okay, please Review. BraviaryGirl7 out!


	12. Chapter 12: The Winged Legends

Me: Okay, here we are. In this chapter, the heroes will fight the Winged Legends. And, possibly learn the truth about Clone. So, without further ado, Chapter 12!

Chapter 12

(Satoshi's POV)

"KKYYYAAAAAAHH!" We prepared to fight the three Winged Legends, though we all knew our chances of winning weren't all that good. I started out with a Thunder Bolt on Articuno, which did some damage and paralyzed it temporarily. I looked to Char, and he took the opportunity to use a Flamethrower on the immobilized bird Pokémon, which took away approximately a quarter of its maximum HP. Meanwhile, Hydro used Water Pulse on Moltres, which took out about a quarter of its HP. Venus used a Seed Bomb on Zapdos, taking one eighth of its HP. Raptor helped Venus fight Zapdos with a Take Down attack. I didn't know where Mew was, but she could have been hiding for all I cared, my focus was all on the battle. Articuno couldn't move, but the other two could, and used Peck on Hydro and Venus, dealing them some damage, but they held on. I used a Thunder Bolt on the paralyzed Articuno, which landed a critical hit, which seemed close to knocking it out, but it had also recovered from paralysis. Char used Flamethrower and Venus used Razor Leaf on Zapdos, cutting down most of its HP. Hydro used Aqua Tail, and Raptor used Ancient Power on Moltres, and it seemed close to fainting as well. The legends were very drained, and could barely stand. But, they suddenly got up and let out their shrieks, as if nothing had happened. But, visibly, they had many scratches all over their bodies. And, I could see some sort of… dark aura emanating around their bodies, it was kind of scary. I knew something was just wrong with this, and I was afraid of badly hurting them.

_You do not have to injure them; you merely need to remove the darkness that is controlling them. _Not that voice again… Lacking other options though, I tried prying more info from the voice.

_What do you mean?_

_This is the power of the Core. _I was about to ask more, but the legends used their attacks on my friends, greatly injuring them. I felt my heart nearly have an attack when I saw them lying still on the ground, and something in the bag started glowing, and the red sphere floated out of the bag and into my hands. The legends were about to advance, but Mew, who had finally come out, held them still with Psychic, and said,

"Do it now!" I held up the sphere towards the birds, and I felt some kind of new power surge through me, but it felt almost… familiar in a way. The sphere glowed brighter, and shone on the three birds, and some kind of shadow thing left their bodies, and they were released from the Psychic, and dropped on the floor. I ran over to my friends and took out three Oran Berries, which they practically gobbled up and perked up almost immediately. Soon however, the Winged Legends got up, but without the soulless eyes and dark aura emanating around them. In fact, they looked very confused, as if they didn't know what had happened. Then, Articuno opened its beak and spoke.

"Um…. What am I doing here? Come to think of it…. Where exactly is 'here'? And… Hey, Zapdos, Moltres, what are you doing here? And why aren't we on Legendary Island? How did we get here? And who are all of you?" They all looked at us confused.

"You don't remember anything?" They thought for a moment, and then said,

"Wait… I remember coming here, yes. We came here, and those black things took over our bodies, and everything after that is a blur…" Mew suddenly Teleported in front of us. Where had she been, anyway?

"In case you are wondering, I was gathering answers to the holes in the story. In other words, I can now virtually completely explain Co—I mean Clone and his plan. However… I guess, first, I will need to explain that Clone… is not who you think he is. He and I used to be the best of friends." Okay, admittedly, that was not what I expected to hear. "Clone is not even his real name. His real name is Cody. He used to be a Mew, just like me, but one day, something terrible happened. Some shadowy creature came and grabbed him, and took him away. The creature did things to Cody; he took away his memories, and turned him into a monster! One day, he came back, but he was so different…. He had truly become something else. He had truly become Clone… A Pokémon called Mewtwo. In a mere display of his power, he completely destroyed our old home… but, please believe me when I tell you that it is not his fault! It is the doing of the Dark Spirit; the very embodiment of darkness. He finds a weakness; any weakness in your heart, and takes over full control. The weapon I was speaking of yesterday; the weapon is….. The Ultimate Dark Beam! It will unleash an attack of darkness on the world that is so powerful, it could destroy the world. And that would be the _best_ case scenario. The worst case scenario would be the world forever shrouded in darkness! It may seem like the preferable fate, but a world of darkness would be so much worse…" Mew shivered a little before resuming talking. "Please, the stakes are so much higher now, not just for the world. I… I just want my friend back. So, I am asking you, I am _begging_ you, please help bring him to his senses. Please." Mew was close to crying now. I looked to my friends, and they nodded. I turned back to Mew.

"Don't worry, Mew. You can count on us." She looked at me, and started crying out of gratitude.

"Th-thank you. Thank you so much." After a few more minutes of crying, I looked off to the tower in the distance.

"Okay, so assuming there isn't some sort of Psychic barrier around the tower, we can get there by flying on Raptor, right?" Mew nodded, but just then, the birds started screeching again, startling all of us. They were struggling, as if fighting for control. Then, they looked like they were being controlled again, and prepared to attack! Just then, Raptor jumped in front of us!

"Go, Mew can use Psychic to get you to the tower! I'll hold them off, just hurry!" I didn't want to do it, but we had no choice. Mew lifted the four of us up, and we all started floating toward the tower. I looked back toward Raptor one last time and heard him yelling taunts to distract the birds. The last thing I heard from him was,

"Yippee-kai-yay, you feathered freaks! Yippee-kai-yay!"

I turned my attention back to the great tower that stood before us, and wondered what we were going to do to bring Clone back to his senses, and if we were going to have to fight him or not, or if we could find a way to avoid fighting him at all. Also wondering about whether or not Cryptic Tower was a Mystery Dungeon, and if so, how many floors it had, and how I was supposed to do… well, everything, basically, had kept me from realizing when we had reached the destination. There was a little piece of land that the tower was resting on, and a Kangaskhan Rock right near the entrance to the tower, which implied that this probably was a dungeon. But, I didn't know for sure, so I wanted to ask, but didn't want to get that attitude, but at the same time, thought something had changed about Mew. Before I could decide, however,

"In case you are wondering, this tower is a Mystery Dungeon. It has 24 floors, and the midpoint is at floor 14. I am afraid this is as far as I can go. As soon as you set foot in the tower, you are on your own." I nodded, and turned my sight back to the tower and then back to my friends. They were down about Raptor, and also exhausted from everything that had happened.

"Hey, Raptor's going to be fine. He's a lot tougher than he looks." That helped cheer them up a little. I could plainly see that they were really tired, and needed to rest, but there wasn't any time for rest. "Can you guys keep going?" They stood up and showed their strength was still intact. I turned back to Mew.

"Mew, don't worry, I promise that we'll do all that we can to stop the Dark Spirit, and bring your friend back." Then, she did something I never thought I had seen her do; she smiled.

"Thank you. I…. am sorry I have been such a pain. Ever since I lost my friend, my personality took a turn for the worst. I did not want to be around others that much, and eventually shut myself out from the outside world. Thank you and….. good luck." We nodded, and began to prepare for the last leg of our journey.

End of Chapter

Me: Alright, so hopefully this chapter was okay, and you now know what kind of Pokémon Clone is, and why I left Mewtwo out of the thing in chapter 10. And as for that thing Raptor said, yes that is a play on words out of that Phineas and Ferb Halloween movie special. Like the—

Doofenshmirtz: (on TV) Yippee-kai-yay you pharmacist freaks! Yippee-kai-yay!

Me: Yeah, that. You got to love that sense of humor, right? Sorry this chapter's kind of short, but the next one will be longer. And—

Doof Zombie: Lots of me. Lots of me.

Me: Aaahh! *runs and hides* Get away, get away, get away! Oh, wait… Zora, is that you?

Zora: *stops Illusion* Sorry, but it wasn't Pichu's idea this time. It was Riolu.

Me: Okay, fine, but he better have a good explanation for this, and for the record, I'm not afraid of zombies, okay? By the way, how did you get your voice to sound like that?

Zora: With this.

Me: Ah, a tape recorder. Clever, I admit. Anyway, please Review. BraviaryGirl7 out!


	13. Chapter 13: Up Cryptic Tower

Me: Okay, I don't know about you guys, but I don't believe in the number 13 being bad luck, so I'm not afraid of writing this chapter 13. I know it may sound kind of interesting that some people do, but I don't believe in bad luck, period.

Yuma and Astral: Number?

Me: Not that kind of number. But, since you're here, have either of you seen Storm and Mist?

Yuma: *gets nervous* Uh… n-no. Can't say I have.

Astral: Yuma, why are you lying?

Yuma: *gives him a look*

Me: …Mist ate your shoes again, didn't he?

Yuma: Uh…. There's that….

Me: And Storm's bothering you?

Yuma: Well….

Me: Ugh! Storm, Mist, come here please!

Mist: *comes up from under table* Uh, I wasn't hiding!

Me: Well, there _you_ are, but where's Storm?

Mist: He said he had to go train or something.

Yuma: *under his breath* Yeah, on us.

Me: I heard that, and I'm sure you're just overreacting.

Yuma: Overreacting?! He jumped on me!

Me: Well, now, that's got to be an exaggeration. Sure, he may come on a little strong sometimes, which may be because I may let him watch cartoons a bit too often, but he's a nice guy.

Yuma: Nice guy?!

Me: Chill out, and watch your tone.

Astral: Yuma, perhaps you _should_ calm down.

Yuma: Not you too!

Me: At least _he's _willing to give Storm a chance!

Mist: Um… am I gonna be introduced?

Me: Oh, yeah. Mist is a Zorua, and Storm's little brother. Mist has a slight behavioral issue, as he has a tendency to eat the shoes of anyone who annoys him. Heck, I've even seen him go into the TV or computer and eat the shoes of an annoying TV character. (In this place, there's a portal which allows you to go into the TV shows, and even allows the characters to come into this world.) Nevertheless, Storm and Mist share a tight bond. The two are very close, and Storm will do anything to help and protect him, and always takes time out of his own schedule to play with him, and is a very good big brother, no matter what _some _people say.

Yuma: Hey, what do you expect me to do?

Me: I expect you to at least give him a chance! And why is it that you're okay with Mist, except when he's eating your shoes, but you can't even stand to be in the same room as Storm?

Yuma: You know EXACTLY why, which is also the reason the whole 'giving him a chance' thing is not happening.

Me: That doesn't have anything to do with the _present._ What's done is done, and the sooner you accept that and move past it, the sooner I'm going to stop holding a grudge.

Yuma: Don't try to give me—Wait, holding a grudge?

Me: …..

Yuma: Oh, the silent treatment, huh? Fine, if you're giving me the silent treatment, then I'm doing it to you too.

Mist: *looks back and forth at Yuma and me* Uh, I'm not entirely sure what's going on, but it would seem that no one in the room wants to talk right now, so maybe we should just start the chapter. BraviaryGirl7 does not own Pokémon. *looks back at Yuma* And especially doesn't own Yu-Gi-Oh. So, please start the chapter, because the silence is starting to get to me.

Chapter 13

(Satoshi's POV)

We had prepared at the Kangaskhan Rock, bid Mew farewell, and headed into the dungeon, still wondering what had happened to Raptor. The dungeon was just, well, a barren stone cold place. The stone was a deep blackish blue color, and there were stone pillars and columns all around the room. We took the path on the left, and soon ended up in the room with the stairs and moved on.

We ended up in a large room with a Wonder Tile and two orbs and some scattered Poké. We picked it up, which added up to 356 Poké and moved down the path that led to the right. We ended up in a smaller room, and took the path leading down south (or whatever the direction was). We soon came to the room with the stairs and moved to the next floor.

We were in a small room with a Cheri Berry in it, and another Wonder Tile. We headed up the path that headed north, and then left and soon came to the room with the stairs in them, along with an Onix which Char knocked out with a Metal Claw and we moved on to the next floor.

We were in a medium sized room with a seed, an orb, and several coins scattered about. The Poké added up to about 638, the seed was a Reviver Seed, and the orb turned out to be an Escape Orb. We took the path on the left, and soon ended up at the stairs.

We ended up in what seemed to be the middle room, and headed down south, or whatever. We found a Big Apple, and the TM Shock Wave in the room we came to, and took the path leading right, which was a dead end, so we went back and took the path on the left, and found the stairs.

We were in what seemed to be the lower right corner of the floor, and took the path leading left, again, then went up and found a Max Elixir in the room, and headed further north, and came to the room with the stairs in them, as well as two orbs which turned out to be a Radar Orb and a Scanner Orb, and we moved to the next floor.

We ended up in the lower left corner this time, and headed north into a room with just a Wonder Tile in it, and headed right. We came to a room with a Stick (4), and headed back down south and came to the room with the stairs in them.

We were in the top right corner now, and headed left and found a room with another Wonder Tile and a Pecha Berry. We took the path leading south, and soon ended up in the room with the stairs in them.

We were in the top left corner of the floor, and headed south and soon came to a room with a Chesto Berry in it, as well as another Reviver Seed. We turned to the right, and then headed down, and found the stairs.

We ended up in the room with the stairs in them, and had to deal with an Alakazam that was blocking the way. It used Psychic on Hydro, who had luckily withdrawn back into his shell using Iron Defense before the Psychic hit him, which greatly diminished the damage he took. After he came back out of his shell, (literally) I used Electro Ball, and followed up with Iron Tail, which knocked it out. After dusting myself off, I lead the team and we moved to the next floor.

We were in a room that was on the far left of the floor that had an orb, which turned out to be a Slumber Orb, and we went through the path leading right. We soon found the room with the stairs, and another Max Elixir. We picked it up and moved to the next floor.

We ended up in a room on the far right of the floor, and headed left, entering a room with another orb and a Max Elixir in it. After picking them up, I realized that the orb was a Spurn Orb, and we headed up north. We soon came to the room with the stairs in them and moved on.

We ended up in what seemed to be the middle room in the floor, with a Luminous Orb and a Big Apple in it. I ate the Big Apple, because I was getting rather hungry, and lead the team down the path leading south (no pun intended) and soon came to an empty room, and went left and finally found the room with the stairs in them, and moved to the next floor which turned out to be the midpoint.

"So, Mew said that there are only ten floors after the midpoint, right?" Char said. I nodded, and allowed the team a short rest before continuing further into the dungeon, due to the fact that we were all very tired already. We replaced any used items, stored any unneeded items, and filled up the rest of the space in the bag with Reviver Seeds from storage. We agreed that we were ready, and moved to Cryptic Spire.

(Cryptic Spire)

The dungeon layout changed quite a bit, as the stone changed from deep midnight blue to stone grey and the structure seemed to be crumbling slightly. The room we were in was small, and it had a Wonder Tile in it, as well as another Stick (4). We went down the path leading right, and soon found the stairs.

The room we ended up in was medium sized with a White Gummi near the wall, and it also had an Oran Berry near the other wall. We took the path leading left, and came to a room with a Sleep Seed in it, and took the path leading down, and found the stairs.

We were in a large room with a Rawst Berry and a Blast Seed and two Wonder Tiles side by side. We took the path leading right, and came to a dead end, and went back. This time, we took the path leading south and found the stairs.

We were in a room that was in what seemed to be the lower right corner of the floor, with a Max Elixir and an Apple in it. We went north, coming to a room with Blast Seed in it. Heading left, we found the stairs.

We were in a room with a Wonder Tile and an Iron Thorn (4), and headed left to find a Slumber Orb in a small room, and went north, finding a room with a Silver Spike (6), and headed right to find the stairs.

We were in a middle room, with an Escape Orb, (a whole lot of good _that_ does us!) and a Jynx that was about to use Avalanche on us, but I Electro Balled it, and then Iron Tailed it, knocking it out. We took the path leading right, and found the stairs.

We were in the room with the stairs in them, but it also had an Exeggutor in it that tried to use Hypnosis on Char, making him fall asleep. That actually was pretty smart… I used Quick Attack on it, and then followed up with an Iron Tail, which knocked it out. We woke Char up and moved to the next floor.

We were in a small room with a Red Gummi and 390 Poké, which I picked up and gave the Red Gummi to Char since our bag was full, who eagerly gobbled it up. We took the path leading left and soon found the stairs.

We ended up in the room with the stairs in them, but they were on the other side of the floor, and there was an Alakazam blocking the way. It used Calm Mind, and then prepared to use Psychic, but I used the Quick Attack-Iron Tail-Electro Ball combo, knocking it out before it could harm us. After that, we went to the stairs and continued to the end of the dungeon.

(Cryptic Pinnacle)

We were finally at the top, in a room that was very large, with crumbling columns around, the typical layout for the final room of a tower dungeon, except for the slightly crumbling pillars. We looked around, trying to spot any signs of Cl—I mean Cody. After a while, we decided that the only way to find him seemed to be calling out for him.

"Hey, Cody, where are you?! Come on out!" Suddenly, a flash of Dark Lightning struck the ground in front of us, the impact sending us tumbling back a bit, and in front of us appeared a tall Pokémon that was cat-like in structure, with long legs, and a long purple tail, and a handle thing going from the back of his head to the top of his spine, pointy ears, and beady purple eyes glaring straight at us. There was no question. It had to be him.

"Well, well, well, Team KantoPals. Come to stop me from destroying the world, I suppose. Unfortunately, I am afraid that is not going to happen." He chuckled evilly. Getting up, I tried to see if I would be able to bring him to his senses.

"Cody, snap out of it! This isn't you! You're not a monster! Please, try to remember!" He was silent for a while, and looked confused before saying,

"Who is this 'Cody' you speak of? I am Clone, the most powerful Pokémon in existence! And if you have come to stop me, the first thing you have to do is defeat me!" He got into Battle Stance, and I realized that there was no way we could get through to him with words.

"Grr, there's no reasoning with him… we have no choice; we have to fight him!"

"What good would that do? He doesn't even remember who he really is! Not to mention Mewtwo is one of the strongest Pokémon ever!"

"You're going to have to trust me on this, if we defeat him, there's something I can do to release the darkness' hold on him!"

"Alright, we all trust you, but I really hope you're right!"

_So do I… _I thought, as I tried to see if I could get more information before having to battle.

"So, Cody, what exactly is this weapon?"

"Why do you keep calling me by that name? Nevertheless, I shall humor you. What fun would it be if you did not even know what was going to destroy you? The weapon… is the one who gave me my powers! Here is how it works; he took control over my body, mind, and heart, and supplied me with ultimate infinite power! In return, I keep the chosen ones from stopping him while he charges up enough power to unleash his attack on this cursed world; The Ultimate Dark Beam Attack! And that is the entire plan, in a nutshell." I couldn't believe it, even after all I'd seen.

"Cody, stop it! Is this really what you want? Do you really want to see the entire world and everyone in it destroyed?"

"Stop calling me that! I am not Cody! I am Clone, the most powerful Pokémon in existence! However, I can plainly see that my suspicions have been confirmed. You are most definitely going to try to stop us, and I cannot let that happen! You will not get to him, as there is the fact that I am not just going to sit around and do nothing while you try to stop him, so you will have to try to get past me first! And the only way to get past me is to defeat me! And although there is absolutely no possible remote chance that you will even come close to defeating me, even if you do manage to somehow defeat me, there is no way you will be able to stop him from his plan!" We got into battle stance, and prepared to fight him as I thought, _I don't care what you say, Cody! We _will_ beat you, and save not only the world, but you as well! We'll stop The Dark Spirit, and we'll do it together!_

End of Chapter

Mist: Um…. Well, no one's talking still, and now the silence has gotten to me so much, I've been talking to myself all day. So, uh…. Oh, hey bro! Where have you been?

Storm: Meditating. And, for the record, Yuma, I wasn't trying to attack you. I thought I saw a spider on your back, and tried to get it off.

Riolu: And it seems my tail didn't quiver the way it does when I sense a lie, so that means he's telling the truth.

Yuma: *face turns red, but tries to hide it* Well, if that's what that was about, then why didn't you just say something instead of jumping on me?!

Storm: I figured you would think I would just be pulling a prank on you, but when I think about it, I suppose that it wasn't exactly necessary to jump on you like I did, so I apologize.

Yuma: ….

Astral: Yuma?

Yuma: ….. Fine. Apology accepted… *under his breath* for this at least…

Me: I heard that. But, I guess this means the silent treatment is off.

Yuma: Yeah, yeah. *stomach growls, and he laughs embarrassed*

Mist: There's spaghetti in the fridge if you want some.

Yuma: Thanks. *leaves*

Me: Well, that problem is solved. Looks like this was all just a big misunderstanding after all. Anyway, I finally got the legendary Pokémon Diancie in my Pokémon X game recently, which is cool, and just in time, as the event ends on Monday. Anyway, in this chapter, I guess I kind of left off at a cliffhanger. In the next chapter, we'll see the final battle between Team KantoPals and the darkness-controlled Clone! By the way, sorry if the dungeon part isn't good, but I'll get better. It'll just take more practice, I guess. To be honest, it's not the dungeon, it's not the journey, it's not even the battles that make me want to continue going with the story. The best part of any story isn't any of those things. The best parts of a story… are the moments between the characters showing displays of friendship, showing the tight bond they all share. That is the best part of any story. That is the best part of life. The friends are always the best part; the fact that they will do anything to help each other, the fact that they will do anything to keep each other going. The fact that… nothing can break the bond. There is absolutely no way that you have experienced true happiness without friendship. Why, you would have to be heartless to not be touched at the mere thought of the greatest wonder that is friendship.

Zora: I love poetry!

Me: Wow, okay, I've really gotten off track here, haven't I? You know what? I have forgotten what I was talking about.

Mist: Um, the best part of a story?

Me: Oh, yeah. That's what I think the best part of a story is. And you know what else? It wasn't my parents who taught me how precious friendship is. It was Pokémon and Yu-Gi-Oh that taught me just how much people take for granted how lucky we all are to be blessed with such a wonderful gift. Which is why I really look up to the main heroes in both shows—uh, three shows. I can definitely count Yu-Gi-Oh Zexal.

Mist: So you're not mad at Yuma anymore?

Me: Nah, why would I be? It was all just a big old misunderstanding, and besides, I can't bring myself to stay mad at anyone. And besides that still, I really honestly look up to the guy. But, one thing I still don't quite understand, why did you eat his shoes?

Mist: Well, he annoyed me.

Me: I mean how exactly did he annoy you?

Mist: *scoffs* How doesn't he?

Me: You know what I mean.

Mist: Alright, alright, he got me annoyed when he started yelling at Storm for jumping on him.

Me: Oh. Well, I guess, in a way that just proves just how tight a bond the two of you share.

Mist: Yep. Besides, the last pair I got was wearing out.

Me: *anime fall*

Mist: What? I need something to work my teeth on. It's as simple as that. If I don't have something to exercise my teeth on, I get all cranky.

Me: *sighs* Fine, but we need to get you out of the habit of eating people's shoes. And get you something else to chew on, like a squeak toy, or a stick, or even a bone. Anyway, I think this has gone on long enough, so please Review. BraviaryGirl7 out!


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